SXMElections.com

PHILIPSBURG--November 25th was International Day for Elimination of Violence against Women and Girls. In observance of the day, Women's Desk with the Ministry of Public Health, Social Development and Labour, together with Community Development, Family and Humanitarian Affairs, organised an awareness event for teenagers in the Philipsburg Cultural Centre.

Some 60 youths, both male and female, attended the event, which was part of a month of awareness activities in five high schools on both sides of the island. The activities at the schools included lessons and workshops by experts including psychologists.

The Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women is the first international human rights instrument to exclusively and explicitly address the issue of violence against women. It affirms that the phenomenon violates, impairs or nullifies women's human rights and their exercise of fundamental freedoms.

The declaration provides a definition of gender-based abuse, calling it "any act of gender-based violence that results in or is likely to result in physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life."

Violence against women is common world-wide, amongst all cultures and skin colours. A presentation by Joy Arnell showed that 70 per cent of all women have been subjected to violence at some point of their lives.

The participants of the event were welcomed by Aida Holaman, who explained that Minister Cornelius de Weever could not be present, but sent his encouragement.

Before the presentation, the youths watched a skit called "Le Menu," written and directed by Earl Duzong who also played a lead role of an abusive husband caught cheating by his wife. She confronts him with a menu of her own, serving up divorce papers as the main course.

In the interactive presentation following the skit Joy Arnell asked the teens present what they believed the message of the skit was. Answers varied from "tell young women to stand up for their rights" and "don't let a man take control of you," to "don't cheat," a comment which was made by a young man.

Arnell impressed on the youth that violence against women has happened for ages and continues to happen. Activities do take place to eliminate this type of violence, but they have not yet been effective enough.

She engaged in discussion with the youth, which showed that they had a good awareness and strong opinions on the matter. What was surprising was that a number of the young people believed that violence against women had a background in slavery. Violence against women, however, is something that affects women of all communities including those without a history of slavery.

An interesting discussion started between two young women with one stating that women put themselves at risk of sexual violence by the way they dress, and another young woman stating that she had the right to go out in her underwear if she so chose without any man harassing her.

The discussion also covered teen dating violence, and they discussed triggers such as partners checking each other's phones or constantly checking up on each other named as early warning signs.

"If we accept men to behave in a certain way towards us, we are enabling abuse too," Arnell said, before pointing out that girls can display this behaviour to boys too.

Arnell asked the group which among them had ever witnessed violence against a woman. At least a third of all hands in the room went up, with a much larger number confirming that they knew or had heard of a woman having been subjected to violence.

The discussion broached matters such as marital rape and domestic violence, both of which occur too frequently on the island and both, to the agreement of all, should be dealt with harshly in law. Forms of violence less common on the island, but more common in other parts of the world were also discussed and explained, such as honour killings and genital mutilation.

Two teenagers pointed out two interesting flaws in St. Maarten culture: the pressure on men always to be perceived as tough, and the fact that culturally people mind their own business and don't interfere in problems of others. Both these behaviours contribute to the problem of violence against women.

The youth discussed what could be done to decrease the problem and the responsibility that each person can take of helping someone they know is a victim. They agreed that a lot came down to education, both at school and also at home, and that parents had a lot to contribute by treating girls and boys equally.

At the end of the event, the teens competed to win two mobile phones. A young man called Percival was named a winner in a contest where they had to come up with a strategy against violence. The winning plan included addressing both the victims and the perpetrators.

Two young women from St. Dominic's High School won the second phone. Initially they tied with two Milton Pieters students in re-enacting a scene from the movie "The Colour Purple," but the St. Dominic's students impressed the crowd by re-enacting, word for word, part of the skit they had seen earlier.

The organisers of the event managed to tackle a heavy and difficult subject in a way that was interesting and challenging for the youngsters and managed to get their full participation.