December 6th marks the end of White Ribbon Days. Not coincidentally, the day is also the anniversary of the Montreal Massacre, a tragedy that occurred in 1989 when 14 women were murdered at the city’s L’Ecole Polytechnique. Vigils were held across Canada today to mark this sombre anniversary.
White Ribbon Days are sponsored by the White Ribbon Campaign. The WRC is the largest movement of its kind in the world, and is organized by men in an effort to eradicate male violence against women. However, the WRC does not make any public statements on December 6 because it believes that men should “step back and listen to the voices of women.”
While certainly not good news, these statistics are worth repeating: Girls are four times more likely than boys to be victims of sexual assault by family members. 12 per cent of girls in grade nine are pressured to have sex. Adolescent wives are three times more likely to be murdered. (Stats courtesy of The Toronto Star)
P.S. (9:55 pm) Just came across this great website created by the National Film Board and the Global Women’s Memorial Society. “The Global Women’s Memorial Website project is dedicated to remembering women who have been murdered & promoting women’s memorials as an act of resistance to violence against women.” It’s worth checking out.
It’s great to see that there are people raising awareness all over the World about womens rights and speaking up about violence against women. I recently learned that Amnesty International is also doing a lot in the way of raising public awareness on the issues still facing women everywhere and are helping women activists in all countries to have a voice against violence without being penalized for it. It’s just great that people are coming together in such a way to promote equality and fairness. I also think it is extremely admirable that the white ribbon campaign was put together by men. I think it shows that awareness is indeed growing on extremely important issues and equality is becoming more of a reality than a simply a hope.