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Gender-Based Violence 101

GBV 101 Learning Objectives

Once you complete the learning and exploration activities throughout this section, you will find that you can:

  1. Explain what survivor centric values are
  2. Explain the difference between being triggered and being uncomfortable
  3. Identify at least 1 or 2 norms that help you feel safer in spaces
  4. Define what sexual violence/gender-based violence is
  5. Explain how the pandemic amplifies gender-based violence
  6. Define Femicide
  7. Define misogyny and misogynoir
  8. Understand what intersectionality means and can explore ways to adapt this to your life and practice
  9. Understand what gender-based violence looks like and sounds like
  10. Found ONE or more ways to prevent or respond to sexual/gender-based violence in your personal life, family, workplace or with peers
  1. Understand the law of consent and the definitions for what sexual violence or harassment looks and sounds like
  2. Challenged your implicit or unconscious bias towards women and feminized people
  3. Define what rape culture is and what it can look like in our daily life, culture, media or institutions
  4. Debunk rape myths
  5. Recognize the signs of abuse or gender-based violence
  6. Adapt or use new tools to support survivors

Survivor-Centric Values

Welcome to this learning!

If you are new to gender-based violence prevention and response learning you may notice that you get uncomfortable. This may feel like your hands getting sweaty, you may be filled with negative or confused feelings, or maybe even disbelief as you learn about sexual/gender-based violence. It's okay to feel uncomfortable from time to time, especially when learning and unlearning. We can sit in that discomfort and learn valuable things when we show up authentically and honestly. Push past the discomfort with an empathetic ear and a critical mind.

Be mindful when asking questions about new information, if you feel yourself getting agitated or angry, perhaps take a pause or minute and just let the feeling be or pass, rather than reacting right away or perhaps even directing it at someone who you feel may have answers or opinions as well. Confronting misogynistic and anti-feminist values is a vital part of this learning. If you need support, seek it out before you ally yourself.

For survivors, this content may be triggering at times or activating please refer back to the introduction where there are supports and resources.

There is a vast difference between feeling uncomfortable with this content and feeling triggered by this content because of your lived experience with gender-based violence. 

When we are triggered, we are no longer in a state that allows us to learn. Becoming triggered or activated happens to survivors of sexual/gender-based violence when they are reminded consciously or subconsciously of previous harm, violence or assault. Our bodies and our minds store our survival experiences and our trauma in different ways at different points in our lives. This is why every survivor has different triggers/activations that change or morph as they heal or as they sadly experience harm again.

"Symptoms conceal and reveal their origins, they speak in the disguised language of secrets too terrible for words” - Judith Herman, Trauma & Recovery, 1998.

Triggers and Impacts

What does it mean to be triggered or activated? 

Triggering or activation occurs in our brains and bodies, chemically, physically, and emotionally. It is a sensation or memory of a trauma or traumas consciously or unconsciously. Being activated/triggered is not something people are imagining in their heads, this is real and often very destabilizing for survivors. Anything can create an activation or trigger, all our adaptive symptoms or coping mechanisms can re-adapt and change over time when we have safety, access to support and care. Being in this activated and fearful state is painful and you deserve support, compassion and control.

Do you know what your triggers or activations are?

Considering exploring this through a small Naming my Triggers/Activations Activity Here, taken from our MOTHS- Managing, Our, Healing & Safety Cohort for Front-line workers 2022.

 

Fight

Fight for your life mechanism

Flight

Run for your life mechanism

Freeze

Immobility or disconnect

Fawn

People pleasing, putting others before yourself, avoidant of conflict to survive

Tip:

Alternatively, combinations of these can sometimes present themselves as well. We can become triggered we are no longer in a state that allows us to learn or feel safe. When people and spaces are not survivor-centric or trauma-informed the people and space can further harm or re-traumatize survivors. Creating trauma-informed systems and survivor-centric spaces can support everyone to feel safer.

 
 

Challenge yourself Did you know that trauma can change our brains early on in life and as we age? Amber Wardell, OAITH’s Aging Without Violence Project Coordinator and team worked on this excellent resource. Check out "Her Brain Chose for Her" and try the online colouring option! It was so fun and informative. 

 

What does being triggered look or sound like?

“It is not what is wrong with her/them? But what has happened to her/them?”
— Jean Tweed (2013) Trauma Matters

There is no one reaction to look out for, triggers can look like so many things to so many people depending on the person, the past event or events, and a multitude of other factors that we will explore throughout this learning.

Here are some insights from survivors:

“I was sitting in a meeting and one of my co-workers just kept talking about an athlete he loved that got “#Metooed” he was saying horrible things about survivors being liars. I just kept looking down and ripping up little pieces of paper on top of my folder until he stopped and I felt like I could breathe again.”
“One time I was on the bus and I thought I saw someone who looked like the man who raped me 10 years ago, I ran off the bus because I felt like I couldn’t breathe.”
“I developed this auditory sensitivity after my traumatic experience, I can’t focus and I feel like I am going to have a panic attack if more than two people are talking to me at the same time.”

What can you do if someone you know is triggered or activated?

  1. Practice empathy:
    With your face, your voice, and your actions.

  2. Check-in & give space:

    Don’t say “Hey Jen, are you, okay you look really upset” in front of a group of people without their consent. Check-in privately with them first. If you notice someone is upset or looks upset, just call a 5 min break and check-in with them confidentially. If you can’t check in or stop, then perhaps change your tone, the environment, or re-direct conversation that may be triggering people or a person.

  3. Do not assume or judge:

    Have resources, solutions, options, affirmations, or just hold space and listen if the person asks for that or needs that.

  4. Encourage their autonomy and choice:

    Do not rush someone to give you an answer right away or a decision right away; they may need more time to think or regulate.

  5. Don’t keep asking “are you okay”:

    Sometimes, yes we are okay, and we just need to adjust and tune in with ourselves or check out. This does not mean we are not paying attention or we are being rude. It means we are working internally really hard to regulate and stabilize.

Survivors of sexual/gender-based violence often struggle with regulating and controlling our threat/stress responses.

This is not our fault and it's within our power to control with time and support. Remember it is really hard to adapt your responses when we feel in danger. We find that there are times we are triggered or times when our body remembers and we react. Or we may find that we are in a prolonged state of disconnect and shielding. These are all adaptations that kept us alive during the active danger, It is also vital to remember that we can adapt our responses with time and practice so that we can feel a sense of safety and stability in our lives and relationships.

Activity #1

Try the Value Setting Activity now before moving on to the next learning section. Utilize the template we created for you. This can help you establish norms and values in your space or with your team. It is a great tool for team meetings, DIY events, and even online groups or gatherings. Establishing values or community agreements shares expectations and norms in the space which can help mitigate harmful behaviours or actions.

Tip:

When you can establish values and expectations before a session, workshop or event, you can ensure everyone has access to what is acceptable in the space and what is not. You can learn more throughout this portal on how to hold safer online spaces and build survivor-centric codes of conduct.

Continue to the next section
 

Sexual and Gender-Based Violence 101

The “Shadow” Pandemic

The United Nations Human Rights Commission's definition of Sexual/Gender-based violence follows:

“Sexual violence is a form of gender-based violence and encompasses any sexual act, attempt to obtain a sexual act, unwanted sexual comments or advances, or acts to traffic, or otherwise directed against a person’s sexuality using coercion, by any person regardless of their relationship to the victim, in any setting. 

Sexual violence takes multiple forms and includes rape, sexual harassment, sexual abuse, forced pregnancy, forced sterilization, forced abortion,  trafficking and sexual enslavement. 

Gender-based violence is considered to be any harmful act directed against individuals or groups of individuals on the basis of their gender. It may include sexual violence, domestic violence, trafficking, forced/early marriage and harmful traditional practices.

An understanding of how gender intersects, for instance, with race, religion, economic situation, political affiliation and geography is also critical to addressing patterns and forms of gender-based violence. Although men and boys are also targets of gender-based and sexual violence in conflict situations, the victims of such violence continue to be disproportionally women and girls (and gender diverse people).”

Did you know?

Facts & Statistics on Gender-Based Violence

Sexual violence is never about sex or sexual desire; it is about disempowering someone through violence, degradation and fear. Rape and misogyny are archaic weapons of war and a form of dominance and control. During displacement and times of crisis, the threat of gender-based violence significantly increases for women, girls, non-binary folks and gender-diverse people.

A pandemic is an infectious disease occurring on a wide scale. Although COVID-19 is a novel virus, women and feminized people are not strangers to pervasive dangers and daily monitoring of our health, safety and livelihood. Gender-based violence, rape culture, and patriarchy are also global infectious threats that jeopardize our individual and collective safety.

Current available evidence shows us that 1 in 3 women will experience sexual violence in their lifetime, and 1 in 6 men will. 

According to the Trans PULSE Project, which researched the social determinants of health for trans and gender diverse individuals in Ontario, 20% of all-trans Ontarians “had been physically or sexually assaulted for being trans, and another 34% had been verbally threatened or harassed.”

Last year, in 2020, 160 women and girls were killed in Canada — almost all by men. Where the relationship is known, half the accused killers were current or former partners and a quarter were family members.

Black and Racialized women are often silenced, criminalized and left out of policy and decision-making processes, perpetrating the cycles of misogynoir and racism and anti-Black racism. When we talk or learn about gender-based violence, we are also learning and talking about racism and Anti-Black racism because they are so intrinsically connected. 

This is why intersectional feminism is critical for any framework, and any framework needs an intersectional feminist lens. Watch the videos below to learn more or read more about location, transnational and intersectional feminism.

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Keep going with this learning

Listen to these Survivors:

To gain a better understanding, read the three survivor stories below. 

While reading through each story, try to reflect on the barriers faced by each person as an embodiment of their intersecting identities, as well as the systems that created such barriers.

These are just three stories, painfully amongst countless others. Their purpose in this lesson is twofold. The first is to show the varying representations of sexual/gender-based violence. The second is to show the interplay of the survivors’ identities, how it affected their situations and the influence on their decision to report the incident. Ultimately, we should be able to take away from these survivors’ experiences that intersectionality is not just a concept, but is indeed a lived reality. The personal is always political. Locational, Transnational and Intersectional feminism teaches us the values of dignity and equity.

Opportunity for continued learning

What is oppression?

It “enables privileged groups to exert control over targeted groups by limiting their rights, freedom, and access to necessary resources and social power.” The keyword in that definition is privilege, the opposite of oppression. Privilege can be defined as “a systematic social advantage that is only available to certain groups that society deems worthy.” Those with privilege in any given situation, create power imbalances that foster dominance, inequity and violence.

Tip:

You will learn more about intersectionality, privilege and power in the Empowered Bystander Intervention section of the portal.

 

True or False?

Click each card to reveal the answer.

STATEMENT 1

In Canada there are over 600,000 sexual assaults reported to the police a year.

TRUE

In Canada, there are 600,000 sexual assaults reported to the police in a year. If that number seems high, remember that only about 5% of survivors report to the police at all, and within that, only 3 out of every 1,000 sexual assaults lead to conviction. The actual numbers are much higher. Many survivors keep their experiences to themselves and do not report sexual violence because of the dehumanizing and re-traumatizing criminal justice system process. This is a severe and longtime contributor to the sexual and gender-based violence pandemic.

STATEMENT 2

Sexual Violence is declining in Canada.

FALSE

Despite more awareness and education, sexual assault is the only violent crime in Canada that has not seen a decline since 1999. Sexual assault is a gendered crime; women/feminized people are victimized at a higher rate, between the ages of 15-34 years old.

STATEMENT 3

Globally it is reported that 1 in 3 women experience sexual violence in their lifetime.

TRUE

Globally, 1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men experience sexual violence. LGBTQ+ women/non-binary people face higher rates of violence and sexual violence than their heterosexual counterparts.

STATEMENT 4

Most women/people who experience sexual violence knew the person before the crime took place.

TRUE

87% of survivors knew the person who committed the assault before the crime took place. It is less likely for a person to be attacked by a stranger than someone who has access to the victim or survivor long term.

STATEMENT 5

Anyone can perpetrate sexual violence.

TRUE

True, and 98% of the time, the assailant is male, whose median age is 33.

STATEMENT 6

In Ontario LGBTQ workers face additional barriers to safety in the workplace, many of us experience homophobia and transphobia at work and in public spaces.

TRUE

In Ontario, 50% of LGBTQ workers have heard homophobic and transphobic remarks, gestures, or micro-aggressions at work. This is a poisoned work environment and is covered under the Ontario Human Rights Code as a form of gender-based violence.

STATEMENT 7

25% of disabled women will experience sexual violence in their lifetime.

FALSE

83% of disabled women will be sexual assaulted in their lifetime.

STATEMENT 8

Sexual violence on campus is a serious issue in many post-secondary settings.

TRUE

More than 80 percent of rapes that occur on college and university campuses are committed by someone known to the victim, with half of these incidents occurring on dates. Young women aged 15 to 24 experience higher instances of sexual violence in Canada than other age groups. One in five women studying at a post-secondary institution in North America experience some form of sexualized violence throughout her studies in post-secondary.

STATEMENT 9

In Canada children and girls are safe, we have systems to protect children and girls from sexual violence.

FALSE

In Canada, approximately 61% of assaults happen to adolescents and children under 18, even though this age group only makes up 20% of the population. According to reports, the highest number of assaults happen to girls and women aged 11 to 19, peaking at age 13.

STATEMENT 10

Every single person has the power to prevent and respond to sexual harassment and gender-based violence.

TRUE

Keep going with your learning. This is a good path to be on. You already have skills, keep building them.

 
“As a culture, we often disregard how violence is fueled by misogyny. We do not label it femicide, and therefore we do not and cannot prioritize prevention or uproot rape culture. This must change.”
— Don’t Rebuild On Our Backs Report, 2020. Dandelion Initiative

What can Sexual/Gender-Based Violence look like?

The Power & Control Wheel

The Power and Control Wheel was developed by the Domestic Abuse Intervention Program from the experience of battered women in Duluth who had been abused by their male partners. It has been translated into over 40 languages and has resonated with the experience of survivors worldwide.

Tip:

The YWCA Power and Control Wheel diagram is a particularly helpful tool in understanding the overall pattern of abusive and violent behaviours.

 

Has it gotten worse for women/feminized people during COVID-19?

The shadow pandemic: combatting violence against women and girls in the COVID-19 crisis

In this diagram from the Centre for Global Development, we see the undeniable evidence that pandemics amplify the already life-shattering impacts of sexual/gender-based violence, especially with increasing economic and family distress.

Did you know? Within the first few months of the coronavirus isolation measures, 1 in 10 women said they were afraid of violence escalating at home.

Many women cannot leave abuse at home with a reduction in services and a lack of support and few options for themselves or their children. Shelters and transitional houses were already at capacity before reducing their available beds and services to mitigate transmission. The impact on women and children is life-threatening. Women and children are turned away from shelters or emergency supports because there simply are not enough. In Canada, almost 19,000 women and children are turned away from shelter and emergency services a year.

 
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Did you know?

This has a devastating impact on front line workers as well, many who are women and survivors themselves. Read this powerful report from Anova Future: Pandemic Meets Pandemic

Did you know?

Findings behind the new Gender Social Norms Index released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) saw the following from their measures of over 75 countries and over 80 percent of the world’s population.  

  • Overall, 90% of men and women hold some sort of bias against women or girls. 

  • Globally, close to 50% of men said they had more right to a job than women. 

  • Almost a third of respondents thought it was acceptable for men to hit their partners.

There are no countries in the world with gender equality, the study found.

 

Reflection Question:

So what can I do as an individual if the problem is so big!?

Keep learning throughout this portal and from diverse sources and survivors. We will provide practical and evidence-based learning opportunities for you to develop skills and tools. Start with reading this short article:

Take action: 10 ways you can help end violence against women, even during a pandemic

 

Challenge: listen and believe

Explore perspectives from survivors themselves

TRIGGER AND CONTENT WARNING
The contents discussed in the videos may be triggering for survivors of sexual violence and/or young children. Please watch with discretion and care for those around you and for yourself.

Please watch this and listen and learn:

Consider reading Know My Name by Chanel Miller after watching.

Please watch this and listen and learn:

 

Activity #2

Try the New Learning Opportunities Activity now before moving onto the next learning section.

 

Before exploring this section and continuing with your learning, let’s check in really quickly together.

  1. How are you doing? Do you need to stretch your legs, do you need water or a break?

  2. Have you taken the Implicit Bias Quiz in Activity #2 in the GBV 101 section?
    Psst. Here it is: Sexist? Take the quiz and find out!

  3. Do you have everything you need before you continue your learning?

Ok, let’s continue our learning.

 

Rape Culture 101

What is Rape Culture?

Emilie Buchwald, the author of Transforming a Rape Culture, describes that when society normalizes sexualized violence, it accepts and creates rape culture. In her book, she defines rape culture as:

“A complex set of beliefs that encourage male sexual aggression and supports violence against women. It is a society where violence is seen as sexy and sexuality as violent. In a rape culture, women perceive a continuum of threatened violence that ranges from sexual remarks to sexual touching to rape itself. A rape culture condones physical and emotional terrorism against women as the norm . . . In a rape culture both men and women assume that sexual violence is a fact of life, inevitable . . . However . . . much of what we accept as inevitable is in fact the expression of values and attitudes that can change.”

 

Reflection Questions

Q: Can you think of iconography or images of women throughout history and all cultures that reinforce Emilie Buchwald’s definition? 

Q: How does society reinforce this set of beliefs?

Did you know?

Studies indicate that professionals in roles of authority and decision-making (i.e. police, clergy, and physicians) are influenced by rape myths in their decision-making. When we buy into myths and stereotypes, we shift the perpetrator’s accountability for sexual violence onto the victim/survivor. Rape myths and sexism still cloud police responses to sexualized violence

 

What upholds rape culture?

Pyramid of Rape Culture

See the roots and progression through this pyramid we created and linked with valuable learning and facts.

We all play a role in upholding rape culture and therefore we all have a role in dismantling it. The intersections between colonialism, racism and sexual violence cannot be separated or ignored. Preventing sexual violence and harassment is not about policing you or your actions.

Learning to act with consent is liberating and creates cultures of dignity, equity, and safety. These are the spaces we all deserve.

Truths from Survivors

“I told my friends what happened and they said ‘he is so nice, he would never do that.’”
“I told my partner I didn’t like what he did and he laughed at me and told me to ‘stop making a big deal.’”
“I saw my friend taking that girl upstairs after giving her too much to drink, but I didn’t want to look stupid and get made fun of.”
“I reported a sexual assault in my school and the process for trying to get some sort of support or accountability was worse than the attack itself.”
“I ended up quitting and relocating since my manager was clearly in favour of the man who assaulted me keeping his job over my safety. I wasn’t going to fight a losing battle.”
“I told my co-workers my boss was harassing me and they said I was just trying to get attention”
“Even the HR processes at my work are not survivor centred or equitable, no way, they want to protect the business and the guy. It doesn’t matter that a woman’s life is often at stake.”

Tip:

Stop and watch this before you continue.

 

We encourage you to watch this before continuing if you are unfamiliar or curious about what misogyny looks and sounds like.

 

What is misogyny?

Misogyny is everywhere, from the norms in our cultures and social groups to advertising, policy, medical practices, laws, education, economics, fashion and on and on. Those who looked up "misogyny" in Merriam-Webster's online dictionary would find a terse definition:

A hatred of women.

We would like to expand the definition to include:

Misogyny is the hatred or dislike of women and feminized people. Misogyny fuels hate crimes and crimes of femicide that lead to the murder of women and girls every 2.5 days across Turtle Island.

 

Opportunities for Learning and Thinking

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What do you see in this photo?

What Does Misogyny Look Like?

 

Women and feminized people experience misogyny regardless of their professions or access to power. Not one of us is immune to this socially accepted form of violence.

Listen to US Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

 

An offering for cis men and allies

Read more here, and talk this out with some men in your life or in your workplace.

 

Activity #3

Try the Debunking Rape Myths activity now before moving onto the next learning section.

 

Online GBV and Harassment

Online Safety and Gender-Based Violence

Nicole Etherington, a Research Associate, Learning Network, Centre for Research and Education on Violence Against Women and Children, Faculty of Education, Western University reports on the definitions of cyber misogyny and the consequences: 

Cyber misogyny refers to the various forms of gendered hatred, harassment, and abusive behaviour targeted at women and girls via the Internet. It draws attention to the discriminatory nature of this behaviour, which occurs within a context of power and marginalization. In this way, cyber misogyny is a more nuanced term than the more general “cyberbullying.”

She continues to inform us that cyber misogyny is most commonly manifested as: “Revenge porn” (we prefer to use the term Sexual Image Based Abuse), cyberstalking; gender-based hate speech online; non-consensual sharing of intimate images; and child sexual exploitation.

The report also states that cyber misogyny has real, tangible, and often devastating consequences for the safety and security of women and girls. Cyber misogyny also violates women’s and girls’ rights to equality and freedom from discrimination and contributes to the normalization of violence against women in mainstream culture.

OCASI defines online hate and cyber violence as increasing extensions of violence against women. 

Cyber-misogyny (coined by Vancouver-based West Coast Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF) is real and rampant. Internationally, and locally referred to as online or information and communication technology (ICT) violence against women/girls.

73% of women and feminized people are abused online worldwide, according to the UN Broadband Commission’s 2015 report.

More than half (52%) of the women polled disagree with this statement: “The Internet is a safe place to express my opinions.”

Young women (age 18-24) are most likely to experience the most severe forms of online harassment, including stalking, sexual harassment and physical threats.

Consequences experienced by victims/survivors include but are not limited to:

 

Financial losses

Damage to personal relationships

Violation of personal dignity and autonomy

Fear for physical and/or psychological safety

Identity theft/fraud

Suicide

Emotional and psychological distress

Violation of privacy

Public humiliation and exposure

Damage to reputation

Job loss

Did you know?

Women who face multiple forms of discrimination, such as racial or cultural discrimination, homophobia, and transphobia, are at greater increased risk of online hate and cyberviolence? Think back to your learning from this portal.

 

Do you know the law?

Do you know what is legal and not legal when it comes to private or intimate photo sharing?

Sending intimate images between adults over the age of 18 is legal when each person voluntarily agrees to participate, and where no intimate image is shared without the person who is in the photo or in the video. The following things are illegal:

  • In Canada, it is against the law to show an image of someone privately doing a sexual act, who is naked, or who is exposing an intimate part of their body without the permission of the person who is in that image.

  • If you threaten to share or show intimate images to others as a way of forcing the person in the image into doing something or not doing something. This is known as extortion.

  • Secretly take someone's photo, to video them, or to spy on them when they are exposing an intimate body part, they are naked, or are engaged in a sexual act. This is known as voyeurism.

  • Also, it is considered identity fraud if someone pretending to be you creates fake accounts of you by using your private photos.

 

Tip:

Read more about online gender-based violence at the following links.

Online gender-based violence (OGBV) is online harassment and abuse of women and non-binary people.

Remote Work Is Leading To More Gender And Racial Harassment, Say Tech Workers

WHY IS ONLINE SAFETY SO IMPORTANT?

Paula Ethans a writer, poet, organizer, and human rights lawyer from Winnipeg, writes: “After her husband broke her rib, Ruby went to an emergency room and then directly to a shelter. The next morning, her husband was knocking on the shelter’s door, demanding that she come out. He had located her using the Find My Phone app.”

 

Did you know?

Ellen Pao, an incredible leader in tech, has created tools and education about the rising gender-based and racial violence women are experiencing at work and in their homes. Ellen says: "There's the assumption that once everybody went separately and you were protected in your own home, that you wouldn't see the same level of harassment," she said. "It turned out that actually wasn't the case."

Caroline Sinders, a researcher who studies online harassment and worked on the Project Include Survey has said “ Many of the software tools remote workers rely on, such as video chat and messaging apps, "were not designed to mitigate harassment," For example, they may not have easy ways built in to flag inappropriate behavior or content and report it to management or human resources.

Suzanne McKie, a London-based employment lawyer says she is also seeing a distinct uptick in complaints of gender harassment and racial intimidation. For example, her clients have reported being excluded from meetings and bullied over video calls — provocations that would have been harder to do in an office with bystanders present. Abruptly leaving a meeting room, for example, is not as easy as hanging up a video call.

 

What can you do about this if you are an employer? 

 

Opportunity for Action

See our template and activity to help you create a form or way to assess your employee or group’s safety.

Click the button to jump to the Staff and Community Online Safety Scan Activity, located in the Workplace GBV section of the learning portal.

Tip:

If you are an individual looking to make your online experiences safer, consider checking out some of our researched resources.

Check out some of our shareables on digital safety for survivors and other community resources!

 

Recognizing Violence or Abuse

Providing Support or Seeking Support 

 

We understand that responding to violence or supporting someone through a violent or harmful situation may be scary and confusing. This does not mean you don’t have the power or skills to learn some simple tools to support someone. 

Remember, we cannot even imagine how much strength or fear it would take for a survivor or victim of gender-based violence to ask for help. Also please remember that situations involving domestic or intimate partner violence are the most dangerous situations for bystanders and the community to intervene in without proper planning, training and support. Survivor, you are not a burden. Your safety is our collective responsibility. 

If you are a survivor seeking support, please visit the links below. They each have a very detailed and comprehensive list of resources, options and supports, or access our resource manual. These articles also help identify the signs of violence (immediate or potential), and are very useful for all people to read and consider.

 
 

Safety Planning and Supports

We have been taught that domestic and family violence is a private issue. This is not true. Domestic and interpersonal violence is a community issue with a huge community impact. 

Leaving an abusive relationship is a highly personal, individual decision, but all survivors benefit from having trusted people during this time. Since those experiencing abuse are often isolated by their abusers, it’s important to know how you can support survivors on their path to finding safety.

Here are some resources and offerings:

How to start a Conversation: Start a Conversation - The Hotline

How to safety plan with a friend: Create a Safety Plan - The Hotline

Safety planning toolkit Toronto, Victim Services. Resources

Native Women’s Resource Centre: You Are Not Alone:

Dandelion Initiative Safety Planning Manual: Supports

Activity #4

Well done, you’ve reached the end of the GBV 101 section of the learning portal!

Try the Survivor Centric Best Practices activity now before moving onto the next portal section, Workplace GBV.