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What you can do to stop violence against women

Individual and collective action are both important in ending violence against women. This page gives ideas for action for those living in Aotearoa New Zealand wanting to end violence against women. 

Getting out of a violent situation
Individual Action
Collective Campaigns
Join the Roundtable!

Getting out of a violent situation

For emergency support services see the front pages in your telephone book. You can also look at our links on help for those experiencing violence.

Individual Actions

• Talk to women about their human rights (everyone is born with rights that no-one can take away from them - the right to life, liberty and security of person, the right to dignity, freedom of thought and opinion, & freedom from torture and fear etc.)

• Report the stories of individual women that give examples of human rights violations

• Promote the facts on all forms of violence against women

• Raise the issue of gender-bias in the way that the state is dealing with domestic violence, sexual violence and other forms of violence against women – especially where victims are not protected and abusers not held accountable

• Explicitly make the links between domestic violence, rape & sexual assault, stranger murder of women, child sexual abuse, forced prostitution, trafficking of women for the purposes of marriage, sexual exploitation, sexual harassment, and honour crimes

• Highlight the links between violence against women in New Zealand  and gender-based violence in other countries

• Encourage all of our communities and our nation to see how violence against women affects us all and must end now

• Make use the resources on this site and connect with those around the country and the world who are also working to end violence against women.

Collective Campaigns

Thursdays In Black
Thursdays In Black is an international movement to demand a world without rape and violence. The campaign has links with several anti-violence movements such as Mothers of the Disappeared in Argentina, Black Sash in South Africa and the Women in Black movements in Bosnia and Israel.

The World Council of Churches promoted Thursdays in Black as a campaign for women’s human rights in the 1980s.

Thursdays in Black links rape and violence against women in war, with the war on women that is waged even in peace time, in homes, streets and communities around the world.

In the mid 1990s the Women’s Coalition of the New Zealand University Students' Association began to promote the campaign in this country, encouraging people to challenge the attitudes that cause rape and violence, and take action.

V-Day End Violence Against Women on Valentine’s Day
14 February
V-day is a global movement to stop violence against women. V-Day involves performances of the Vagina Monologues, and other awareness raising events on Valentine’s Day.

White Ribbon Day: International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women
25 November
White Ribbon Day is an international day focused on men working to end men’s violence to women.

Wearing a white ribbon is a personal pledge to never commit, condone or remain silent about violence against women and girls.

White Ribbon Day was started by a group of Canadian men in 1991. Since then, people around the world have developed campaigns and activities aimed at encouraging men and boys to speak out against men’s violence towards women.

The day has been officially adopted by the United Nations as its International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. The United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) introduced the campaign to New Zealand.

For information on white ribbon days in other English Speaking countries see:
http://www.whiteribbon.ca/
http://www.whiteribbonday.org.au/
http://www.whiteribboncampaign.co.uk/
http://www.whiteribbonscotland.org.uk/

16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence
25 November to 10 December
The 16 Days of Activism runs from 25 November, International Day Against Violence Against Women, to 10 December, International Human Rights Day. It is an international campaign that started in 1991 from the first Women's Global Leadership Institute. Today women’s rights and human rights activists around the world run campaigns and events that focus on women’s human rights.

Join the Roundtable!

Visit our membership page to find out how to get involved in the Roundtable.