Direct Donations to Lawyers Against Abuse through the #SPRINTFORHERFROMHOME campaign currently amount to R23 816.03. Inclusive of donations made through Global Giving on this page, the total amount raised as of 03 June 2020 is R34 242.73. Let's keep going!
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It is trite that levels of gender-based violence in South Africa are at grotesque and unacceptably high levels. However, when President Cyril Ramaphosa declared a national state of disaster as a response to the COVID-19 outbreak, this COVID-19 pandemic coincided with an existing pandemic of violence on the basis of sex and/or gender. We note that the lockdown, a responsible and evidence-based response, has exacerbated our existing social ills. In particular, the lockdown has further perpetuated and prompted violence against women whether it be physical, emotional and/or psychological. Coupled with this, the lockdown has created barriers for victims and survivors to access care, support and help. As it has been said “[f]or some of the women … the outside world is often safer than their own homes. At its core, abuse is about power and control. When victims/survivors are forced to stay in the home with their abusers they may are vulnerable to further abuse.”
While #sprintforher is a long-term online community of support for victims and survivors of gender-based violence, we have established this specific campaign, #SPRINTFORHERFROMHOME (in partnership with Candice Langford Pelvic Physio), in light of the starkly negative consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on victims stuck in domestic violence situations.
Our goal for this predominantly Instagram-based campaign is multi-pronged:
1. ONLINE COMMUNITY OF SUPPORT THROUGH EXERCISE:
Exercise is an avenue for physical and mental well-being. Our aim is to create an online community of support, care, awareness and respect for victims and survivors of domestic violence. We want to create a community where we can feel empowered, beautiful and proud of our bodies as well as keep them active and healthy. Most importantly, we want survivors to feel strong in their bodies and ultimately reclaim them from the trauma that they have endured.
We welcome all forms of exercise participation (for any fitness level and ability), followed by posting about your workout online, tagging our account and using our hashtag to keep the community going.
2. AWARENESS:
We aim to use this event as a means for an educational campaign and to create a conduit of resources for victims and survivors. Follow us on social media as we spread awareness of gender-based violence, its causes, consequences and what individuals can do (especially during the lockdown) to help.
3. DONATE:
We want to make a practical impact and as a result, we have partnered with the highly regarded Lawyers against Abuse (LvA) – an organisation that aims “to provide holistic legal and physical support to victims of gender-based violence and to facilitate structural change through strategic engagement with state actors and the communities in which [they] serve”. LvA operates in Diepsloot, which is located approximately 40km from Johannesburg and is notorious for its high levels of gender-based violence. The victims and survivors that LvA seeks to assist includes: mostly black women and girls and may include women with disabilities, lesbian and bisexual women, transgender and intersex people and HIV-positive women.
We fully endorse their holistic approach to help victims and survivors through legal assistance; psychological support and community education programs. We are committed to working closely with LvA and ensuring that the funds raised will go towards assisting victims and survivors during the lockdown and in the long-term. To learn more about the important work LvA do, please check out this link: https://www.lva.org.za.
4. FOLLOW US & SHARE OUR MESSAGE:
We want our community to thrive in its diversity. Please follow our pages (predominantly on Instagram, but also on Facebook) to see how you can get involved. Share our events, education campaigns, fundraising efforts and our story. If you have social media, please send us a photo of you exercising, tag @sprintforhersa and use the hashtag #sprintforher.
