Orange the World campaign launched by the UN, is a multi-year effort aimed at preventing and eliminating violence against women and girls, will focus on the issue of rape as a specific form of harm committed against women and girls in times of peace or war. Millions of Social Media posts have been made from all over the world by people to show their solidarity for the campaign. However, the UN has made a remark that this is not enough.
Kalliopi Mingeirou, head of the Ending Violence Against Women Section of UN Women has said, the root cause of violence against women and girls is gender inequality. Therefore in order to effectively eliminate violence against women, more investment should be made to address gender inequality.
“We know evidence shows that campaigns are not enough and do not change the mentalities of people. They really do not work on their own. Now we know we have increasing evidence that violence against women is preventable, and we have some strategies that can work,” Mingeirou said in an interview with Devex.
Increasing investment and working towards improving these preventive techniques can work in favour of the cause.
In addition to this according to Mingeirou, long-term support relating to housing and employment needs to be extended to the gender-based violence survivors.
Working on Policy and Framework
It is very important to have stringent laws on domestic violence and sexual violence by every country. Currently, about 1 in every 4 countries do not have laws on domestic violence. Marital rape has been criminalised by only 41% of the countries in an explicit manner. However, enforcement of these laws all over the world has remained a challenge. Therefore, in order to address the issue, the governments of various nations will need to work in collaboration with the enforcement agencies as well as the civil society.
Including more women in police and military forces
Women have been often viewed as the weaker sex who need to be protected. The crimes against women are often committed during a war to not only attack the women, but also the psyche of the men of her family who would feel inadequate for being unable to save her. Women at times like these lose their ability to trust other men, even if they are only trying to help them.
Having more women in police or military forces can provide comfort to victims. It can also help in changing the perception of women as weaker sex which can prevent such crimes.
This article is part of our series on the international 16 Days of Activism campaign with the theme “Orange the World”.
