Elimination of Violence Against Women

Like millions of other women around the world, my mother was murdered by a man she knew well. This International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, I’m thinking of her and all female victims of gendered violence. The epidemic of murderous violence against women must end–enough is enough. According to a new report, more than half of the 87,000 women killed in 2017 died at the hands of those closest to them–approximately 30,000 women were killed by an intimate partner and another 20,000 by a relative. The most dangerous place for women, according to a UN study, is her home. In these sixteen days of activism, let us not be afraid to share the violence we have experienced, give voice to the horrors of being a woman in this violent world, and come together in solidarity to combat the worldwide epidemic of violence against women.