Reflecting on the Rose Campaign
Each year, YWCA Canada launches the Rose Campaign to end violence against women and girls, which runs between November 25, the International Day for the Elimination of Action on Violence Against Women and December 6, Canada's National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women, and calls on Canadians to work for change. The Campaign takes its name from the Rose button that commemorated the murder of 14 young women at Montréal's l'École Polytechnique on December 6, 1989.
Twenty-two years later, violence is the leading cause of women's homelessness, and homelessness leaves women at great risk of violence. Each year, 100,000 Canadian women and children leave home for emergency shelter, beginning a quest for a safe home that may take years to secure. The number of missing and murdered Aboriginal women shows that many never succeed. Our Rose Campaign message for 2011 is simple and clear: Every woman needs a safe home.
There are many ways individuals can support the Rose Campaign and raise awareness about violence against women and girls at home, schools, places of business and in the community. Rose buttons can be purchased buttons at $1 each (minimum order of 50) to wear. Our online store features a host of products to take action including postcards, posters, magnets, brochures, bookmarks, tote bags and copies of our video release Living Beyond Shelter: Videos for Change at http://store.ywcacanada.ca. Individuals can also take part in our online campaign, and send a virtual Rose to Canadian MPs at www.rosecampaign.ca or " scatter petals" by downloading our embedded Rose logo to Facebook, Twitter, blogs or email signatures. Don’t live in Canada? No problem, you can still send a message to the Canadian Prime Minister asking for action on his Throne Speech promise to end violence against women and girls, using the online tool on the website.
Other ways the Rose Campaign works to deliver the message include directly reaching out to Canadian members of parliament in their constituency offices on Friday, December 2, 2011, our National Action Day on Violence Against Women. We visited as many MPs as we possible, and welcomed participation from staff, volunteers and supporters across the country. Additionally we held our annual press conference on Parliament Hill, as well as held a MP Breakfast with Campaign 2000, another national organisation working to end child and family poverty, in which we highlighted the intersections of poverty, violence and women’s homelessness. Thousands of people from across the country sent a rose to their MP or scattered petals by downloading our embedded rose logos to their blogs, websites and social network profiles. We were particularly touched to see so many people change their profile picture on Facebook and Twitter to our December 6 button and make this year’s campaign go truly viral.
The Rose Campaign is just one of the ways in which the Canadian movement works towards achieving the goal of eliminating violence against women in all its forms. YWCA Canada hosts a major campaign during the Week without Violence, reaching out to over 15,000 people annually in school groups, faith-based organizations and community agencies across the country. Throughout the week we work to create partnerships and collaborate on VAW related issues and encourage individuals and communities to identify realistic and sustainable alternatives to violence. The support and involvement of schools, community organisations, politicians, law enforcement agencies, faith groups and individuals is at the heart of the campaign. The YWCA Week without Violence activities are hosted by individual YWCA Member Associations who work to make violence a thing of the past.
Violence against women is the world's largest and most persistent human rights violation. In Canada, it is a $4 billion a year problem. Over 50% of Canadian women will experience an incident of violence at some point in their lives, the majority before they turn 25. You can take action for change by supporting the Rose Campaign to foster a healthy society by promoting it within your community and sharing it within your networks.
YWCA Canada is the country’s oldest and largest women's multi-service organization. With 34 Member Associations operating in more than 400 districts and communities across the country, our Turning Point Programs for Women™ - which address personal safety, economic security and well-being – reach out to 1 million women, girls and their families. YWCA is the largest national provider of shelter to women, serving 25,000 women, children and teen girls including 6,000 fleeing domestic violence each year. We are the largest provider of literacy, life skills, employment and counselling programs in the country, and the second largest provider of childcare services. YWCA Canada is a member association of the World YWCA which unites 25 million women and girls worldwide and spans 125 countries. For more information about YWCA Canada, visit www.ywcacanada.ca or find us on Facebook www.facebook.com/ywcacanada and Twitter @YWCA_Canada.
