Some dancers in Athabasca will be standing up for the approximately one billion women in the world who are victims of abuse.
On Feb. 13, the One Billion Rising “flash mob” campaign to raise awareness for the one in three women worldwide who will experience abuse at some point in their lives will take place in Athabasca.
“It’s an awareness campaign. We did it last year and it’s growing. Drayton Valley does it, Edmonton’s doing it, I’m not sure where else. I think Whitecourt is going to start,” said Brenda, a worker at THRIVE – a relationship abuse program in Athabasca.
“(In) our native population, it is one in three that will experience some type of abuse. So, you think about it, (when) you’re standing in a grocery line (and) there’s three people, it’s probably one of them.”
This is the second year that the campaign will take place in town – the movement itself started in 2012 – though there will be a bit of a difference this year.
“It’s supposed to be worldwide, a whole world standing up at the same time type of thing. That never does work totally perfectly. February 14 this year is a Saturday and it’s like ‘Okay, let’s do the Friday.’”
There will be a performance at Canadian Tire at noon, then at Buy Low at 12:30 p.m. Other businesses might yet participate, but those have yet to be scheduled.
They are still looking for participants in the movement. The group is practicing on Thursday at noon at the 27/4 Hip Hop Studio.
“Last year, we had 20-some women come and dance,” she stated.
“It’s not just women, men can join too. Actually, there’s a whole men’s program, but we just do the dance. It can be anybody, anybody at all. I just wanted to let everybody know that we’re doing it again so come watch and see and stand up with us.”
Brenda believes the campaign is working.
“We had a lot of people watching and asking questions. And that’s the thing. You want people to ask questions; you want people to want to know why we’re doing this. It’s not just for fun,” she said.
“That’s what we want – conversation – because we don’t want this to be a hidden problem. The more we bring it out into the open, the more we can help.”
