In spirited support of November as ‘Family Violence Awareness Month’, the fourth annual Take Back the Night event will be hosted on Nov. 2 at the Frank Wills Memorial Hall at 7 p.m.
The Cochrane Youth Association (CYA) will be partnering up with Cochrane Family and Community Support Services (FCSS) and volunteers from Peer Support Services for Abused Women (PSSAW) to host the evening event, which will feature personal stories from survivors of domestic abuse, followed by a walk to close off the evening.
The walk will be from the Frank Wills Hall to the gazebo located on Main Street, where refreshments will be served upon arrival.
The event is centered on raising awareness about and taking a stand against family violence.
“These speakers are definitely worth coming out for,” said Candy Weisner, event committee member and FCSS programmer. “They are volunteers speaking from their own experiences. Each year, we bring different speakers, so info on this is of interest to those who come yearly to see the current topic and may also attract new attendees.”
Another part of the evening’s celebration will be the grand opening of The Clothesline Project display, which began in 1990 in Hyannis, Mass; the project is a large-scale, ongoing art memorial of T-shirts decorated and created by women around the world who have experienced violence in one form or another.
Cochrane and Calgary survivors will be unveiling their own T-shirts, which will be on display to the public for the first time ever on the night of the event.
“The purpose of this event is to give voice to the violence against women that is occurring in our very own community,” said FCSS programmer Rebca Zawde from FCSS.
“Although it is hard to come up with a statistical figure, we do see waves of clients who are victims of both domestic and sexual violence. Take Back the Night provides a space where we can stand in solidarity against violence towards women.”
Event organizers are hoping for a healthy turnout this year, building on the momentum of the preceding three annual events.
Tickets are $10 and are available at the door or ahead of time at FCSS at 403-851-2250.
“We want to see a great turnout in our community. In the past, this has been a good evening for colleagues to come together...there is no community that has not been touched by this, unfortunately. This is an opportunity to come together and give hope for a better future,” said Weisner.
The intention of the event is to bring the subject of domestic violence out of the darkness and into the open.
“The purpose of this event is to start a conversation to create awareness on this issue, inform and educate the community about resources available to them...” said Karri Berg with the CYA.
