Gender-based violence (GBV) and Earth
The 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence run from 25 November (International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women) to 10 December (Human Rights Day). On these days, people are encouraged to speak up and work against views, teachings, traditions, and cultures – including religious and churched ones – that ignore, hide, and may even encourage, gender-based violence (GBV).
The 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence run from 25 November (International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women) to 10 December (Human Rights Day). On these days, people are encouraged to speak up and work against views, teachings, traditions, and cultures – including religious and churched ones – that ignore, hide, and may even encourage, gender-based violence (GBV).
Most of the victims of GBV are women and sexual minorities, and the global statistics are sickening. For example, 1 in 3 women experience violence in their lifetime; 1 in 4 adolescent girls is abused by a partner; and a woman is killed every 10 minutes – about 60% of whom, by a partner or family member.
Closer to home
In my home island of Tonga, 79% of Tongan women and girls reported having experienced physical or sexual violence in their lifetime (see here).
In the cluster of islands now known as Aotearoa New Zealand, where our daughter attended kindergarten for 1.5yrs, 1/3 of NZ women in a global survey said that they experienced online abuse and harassment (see here).
And in the cluster of islands now known as Australia, where our daughter now attends primary school, 61% of LGBTQ+ folx have experienced violence from an intimate partner (see here).
GBV is real, and it is heavy and excruciating upon women and sexual minorities.
Caveat
I hasten to add two qualifications: Men also experience violence, but not because of their gender. And the abusers / criminals in GBV cases are not all men. Some women and sexual minorities are among the abusers.
These qualifications are not meant to take the focus away from the painful fact that the majority of GBV victims are women and sexual minorities.
Women crisis centres
GBV victims are not left to fend for themselves. There are services that have the well-being of women and children, for example, in Australia (see here and here), Aotearoa New Zealand (see here), Fiji (see here), Tonga (see here), and Samoa (see here). There are services in other Pasifika nations also, supported by local governments and churches.
What we need more of, are programs that are intentional about reducing and stopping GBV.
Earth
Earth too experiences abuse, meted out by human minds and human hands. We humans were expected to be good shepherds for and with Earth, but we have destroyed and scattered the household of Earth. Put bluntly, the injustices that Earth faces is the result of our – human – evil doings.
Earth shares the same need with the victims of GBV – the need for a way of peace that encourages justice and righteousness. These three – peace, justice, righteousness – are cold and standoffish on their own. But together, they are fair toward perpetrators (giving them what they deserve) and they embrace the victims.
Climate Lectionary Reflections
The 3 Climate lectionary reflections during the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence bring the sin of GBV alongside the abuse of Earth, also a form of sin, and reaches out for some “way of peace” where “tools for peace” are made available, and victims are given space to be “restless.”
