Putting end to violence is GiRL FeST's mission | The Honolulu Advertiser

Comment, blog & share photos

Putting end to violence is GiRL FeST's mission | The Honolulu Advertiser | Hawaii's Newspaper

Posted on: Friday, September 1, 2006

Putting end to violence is GiRL FeST's mission

•	Let's hear it for girls

By Catherine E. Toth
Advertiser Staff Writer

NEED HELP?

The Sex Abuse Treatment Center: 524-7273

Legal Aid Society of Hawaii: 536-4302

PACT (Parents and Children Together): 847-3285

The Domestic Violence Clearinghouse & Legal Hotline: 531-3771

LEARN MORE

National Coalition Against Domestic Violence: www.ncadv.org

Family Violence Prevention Fund: www.endabuse.org

The National Domestic Violence Hotline: www.ndvh.org

The Office on Violence Against Women: www.usdoj.gov/ovw

Women Against Domestic Violence: www.wadv.org

The 3rd annual GiRL FeST Hawaii is more than just a multimedia art and education festival.

It's got a serious mission: to prevent violence against women and girls through education and art.

"This problem is pretty universal, and I think what makes it flourish is the culture of silence," said Kathryn Xian, a filmmaker who calls herself the nonexecutive director of the event. "And you have that in various communities ...

"What makes it slightly different now is that never before have mass media propagated a message of (violence) being cool. It's almost as if our generation has been inundated with messages of powerful being related to violent."

According to the nonprofit, one death a month in Hawai'i can be attributed to domestic violence. A third to half of the police department's work is spent tending to domestic-violence calls.

Here are some other startling stats:

One in four women will experience domestic violence during her lifetime, according to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

On average, 25 rapes are reported each month in Hawai'i, according to stats compiled by GiRL FeST Hawaii.

In 2005, 574 more rape victims sought treatment at the Sex Abuse Treatment Center than during the previous year. Fifty victims were male and 524 were female. Nearly one in three — 30 percent — were younger than 10 at the time of the assault. Almost all of the victims — 90 percent — knew the person who sexually assaulted them.

Women 16 to 24 experience the highest per-capita rates of intimate violence — 16 per 1,000 women — according to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Seventy percent of teenage and college women who are sexually assaulted are raped during the course of a date.

In the U.S. every year, about 1.5 million women and more than 800,000 men are raped or physically assaulted by an intimate partner, according to the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. Intimate-partner violence results in nearly 2 million injuries and 1,300 deaths nationwide every year.

Whether people attend a workshop or a concert, an open-mike or a comedy show, GiRL FeST organizers hope they walk away with a feeling of being represented.

"Equity and equality is what we're after here," Xian said. "I don't think there's enough (representation) in any form in our community, whether in media or arts or government or academics. Equal representation is provided by the Constitution. But if you want it, you have to fight for it. And we're trying to do that in a nonthreatening way."

Reach Catherine E. Toth at ctoth@honoluluadvertiser.com.

Sponsored by:

Comment, blog & share photos