today is V-Day- End Violence Against Women Day
(and this country STILL has not ratified CEDAW, and with the current maladministration, not going to)
http://www.vday.org/
http://www.onebillionrising.org/
V-Day is a global activist movement to end violence against women and girls*. V-Day is a catalyst that promotes creative events to increase awareness, raise money, and revitalize the spirit of existing anti-violence organizations. V-Day generates broader attention for the fight to stop violence against women and girls, including rape, battery, incest, female genital mutilation (FGM), and sex slavery. Through V-Day campaigns, local volunteers and college students produce annual benefit performances of The Vagina Monologues and A Memory, A Monologue, A Rant and A Prayer to raise awareness and funds for anti-violence groups within their own communities. Each year, thousands of V-Day benefit events take place produced by volunteer activists in the U.S. and around the world, educating millions of people about the reality of violence against women and girls.
Performance is just the beginning. V-Day stages large-scale benefits and produces innovative gatherings, films and campaigns to educate and change social attitudes towards violence against women. These include the documentary Until The Violence Stops; community briefings on the missing and murdered women of Juarez, Mexico; the December 2003 V-Day delegation trip to Israel, Palestine, Egypt and Jordan; the Afghan Women's Summit; the March 2004 delegation to India; the Stop Rape Contest; the Indian Country Project; Love Your Tree; the June 2006 two-week festival of theater, spoken word, performance and community events UNTIL THE VIOLENCE STOPS: NYC; the 2008, V-Day 10-year anniversary events V TO THE TENTH at the New Orleans Arena and Louisiana Superdome; the Stop Raping Our Greatest Resource: Power To The Women and Girls of the Democratic Republic of Congo Campaign; the V-Girls Campaign, and the V-Men Campaign.
In conjunction with the 15th anniversary, V-Day launched its most ambitious campaign to date - ONE BILLION RISING. One Billion Rising is the biggest mass action to end violence against women in human history. The campaign, launched on Valentine’s Day 2012, began as a call to action based on the staggering statistic that 1 in 3 women on the planet will be beaten or raped during her lifetime. With the world population at 7 billion, this adds up to more than ONE BILLION WOMEN AND GIRLS. On 14 February 2013, people across the world came together to express their outrage, strike, dance, and RISE in defiance of the injustices women suffer, demanding an end at last to violence against women. On 14 February 2014, One Billion Rising for Justice focused on the issue of justice for all survivors of gender violence, and highlighted the impunity that lives at the intersection of poverty, racism, war, the plunder of the environment, capitalism, imperialism, and patriarchy. For the third year of the campaign, One Billion Rising’s global coordinators chose the theme of “Revolution” as an escalation of the demand for justice, and to build upon the massive efforts of communities worldwide that also looked at the roots and causes of violence as part of their call for justice. On14 February 2015, millions of activists in over 200 countries gathered to Rise for REVOLUTION, to change the paradigm, demand accountability, justice and systematic CHANGE. They rose to show we are determined to create a new kind of consciousness – one where violence will be resisted until it is unthinkable. In 2016, the theme of Revolution continued with a call to focus on marginalised women and to bring national and international focus to their issues; bringing in new artistic energy; amplifying Revolution as a call for system change to end violence against women and girls; calling on people to rise for others, and not just for ourselves. In 2017, the theme is Solidarity to End the Exploitation of Women. We invite you to join us, visit www.onebillionrising.org.
V-Day, a non-profit 501c3 corporation, distributes funds to grassroots, national and international organizations and programs that work to stop violence against women and girls. V-Day has received numerous acknowledgements and awards and is, one of the Top-Rated organizations on both Charity Navigator and Guidestar. In 2001, V-Day was named one of Worth Magazine's "100 Best Charities," in 2006 one of Marie Claire Magazine's Top Ten Charities, and in 2010 was named as one of the Top-Rated organizations on GreatNonprofits. In eighteen years, the V-Day movement has raised over $100 million.
The 'V' in V-Day stands for Victory, Valentine and Vagina.
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V-Day, February 14, is a global activist movement to end violence against women and girls started by author, playwright and activist Eve Ensler. It has been co-ordinated by a 501(c)(3) organization since 1998 which allows royalty-free performances of The Vagina Monologues to be held for charity every February 14. Ensler has been quoted as saying that it was women's reactions to the play that inspired her and her colleagues to launch V-Day. The 'V' in V-Day stands for Victory, Valentine and Vagina.
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In 1998, a non-profit charity, "V-Day", was incorporated with the intent of using performances of The Vagina Monologues to raise money to benefit female victims of violence and sexual abuse. Since its inception, the movement has expanded its use of art and activism to include screenings and reading — most notably of the documentary Until The Violence Stops (2004) and the compilation A Memory, Monologue, A Rant, and a Prayer. Marches and festivals that have been held as part of the movement include UNTIL THE VIOLENCE STOPS: NYC (June 2006), and the ten-year anniversary V TO THE TENTH at the Louisiana Superdome and New Orleans Arena in 2008.
Beginning in early 2001, V-Day activities expanded to the international stage, with V-Day hosting leadership summits for women in Afghanistan and a gathering of activists in Rome. V-Day also launched the Karama program in the Middle East and coordinated community briefings on the missing and murdered women of Juarez, Mexico. In some societies where censorship forbids performances of The Vagina Monologues, events revolve around other works developed by V-Day, including the book A Memory, a Monologue, a Rant, and a Prayer, an anthology of writings about violence against women. V-Day included the first ever all transgender version of The Vagina Monologues in 2004, with a performance by eighteen notable transwomen under the mentoring of Jane Fonda and Andrea James of Deep Stealth Productions.[1] Consistent growth of the movement led to 5,400 events in 1,500 locations taking place in 2010 alone. It was then estimated that $80 million had been raised since the movement's inception with over 12,000 community-based anti-violence programs and safe houses in The Congo, Haiti, Kenya, Egypt and Iraq receiving funding.
According to its website, V-Day's vision is "a world where women live safely and freely." They aim to tackle issues such as rape and battery of women, incest, female genital mutilation and human trafficking of female sex slaves. The organization seeks to strengthen existing anti-violence efforts by raising money and consciousness, and to lay the groundwork for new educational and protective legislative endeavours for women throughout the world.[2] V-Day's work is grounded in four core beliefs.[3] These stated as:
Art has the power to transform thinking and inspire people to act.
Lasting social and cultural change is spread by ordinary people doing extraordinary things.
Local women best know what their communities need and can become unstoppable leaders.
One must look at the intersection of race, class, and gender to understand violence against women.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-Day_%28movement%29