What you can do to End Violence against Victims in Your Community
- Call the police when you see or hear someone being assaulted. You could be saving someone´s life.
- Call your local domestic violence agency and offer to volunteer (in shelters, on hotlines, in court or with children´s programs, on committees, fundraising and outreach) or make a donation.
- Educate yourself about violence against people as a human rights issue. Understand violence from a broader, socio-political perspective, and its connection to other forms of oppression, such as racism, heterosexism and classism.
- Invite Women Helping Battered Women to your class, civic group, workplace or faith community. We offer a range of workshops (for all ages) that can be tailored to your group´s needs.
- Dedicate two hours each month to writing letters to the editor, political officials, police chiefs, prosecutors, judges and public defenders about violence issues.
- Encourage your local school to teach gender equity and violence prevention.
- Supervise what your children watch on television and at the movies.
- Advocate for non-violent shows.
- Purge your speech of violent images (“I am going to kill you”).
- Do not participate in sexist jokes.
- Do not blame the victim. Ask why they batter, not why the victim stays.
- During political campaigns, ask the candidate what specific actions they will take to end violence.
- Offer support to victims of domestic violence by telling them: “No one deserves to be abused.” Stress positive attributes and strengths.
- Take domestic violence seriously.
