Morning all! This week’s nomination comes from the brilliant Katie Salt and is directed at both the immediate prevention and long term cure for a danger that sadly plagues our country. We applaud the women who started StrutSafe to help women feel safer walking home at night but recognise that this should never be necessary. So it’s with pleasure we split the pot with Beyond Equality to invest in education and a more enlightened and safer future for everyone
Lots of love xxx
Dear 500 Reasons admin team,
This weeks nomination is not one that makes me happy to submit. However, given the horrific spate of violence against women that still seems so prevalent in our lives - I feel I have little choice but to reach out to good people and ask for help.
Last year 139 women were killed by men in the UK alone. On average 2 women a week at the hands of a domestic parter, and the rest killed by other men, known and unknown to themselves. All these women were killed while simply living their lives, and had their lives cruelly cut short by senseless violence. All these women had a right to walk around the world safely and that right was cruelly taken from them. When a women is murdered in this way, the loss is of course felt the deepest by those who knew and loved the victim - but it is also by every woman who is reminded once again that we are not safe.
I would like to request that this weeks donation by split in two - with the first half going towards short-term prevention and the second half going towards long-term cure.
I read on the bbc website about two women that bought a phone in Edinburgh, circulated the number all over town and made sure there was always a friendly voice at the other end if women felt scared or under threat walking home. Alice, 22, and her friend Rachel Chung came up with the idea of a telephone helpline that people can call if they're walking home alone at night in April 2021. The link is here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-60055916
It wasn't long after they had attended a vigil for Sarah Everard.
"We were devastated and angry," Alice says, "so we bought a cheap burner phone, asked people to volunteer to answer it, and posted the number in community groups." https://www.strutsafe.org has been taking calls every weekend since.
I want to be very clear, I do not think it is a woman’s responsibility to keep herself safe from the threat of violence - and I hope that with better education and systematic change, women will not need to use any additional services to be awarded the basic human right of safety. But I hope this money can be used to help women feel a bit safer tonight.
Looking towards the cure, I’d like to split this week’s money with another group called https://www.beyondequality.org who are working with men and boys towards gender equality, inclusive communities, and healthier relationships. I believe it is only with education at this level and with investment in nurturing young men to challenge patriarchal ideas that we can see true change for all in the future and a world where all human beings regardless of gender can feel safe and look after each other with kindness.
Thanks
Katie x