World Pulse, launch of ‘Ending Violence Against Women Digital Campaign!’

Ending Violence Against Women Digital Action Campaign!

World Pulse is excited to announce the official launch of our Ending Violence Against Women Digital Action Campaign! We invite you to join us in speaking out against violence as we showcase the voices and solutions of grassroots women around the world. We believe that your stories, recommendations, and collective rising leadership can—and will—bring an end to gender-based violence.

Tell us your own story and perspective on violence against women, either personally experienced or witnessed in your community, and outline your vision for change.

In this campaign, World Pulse will spotlight your testimonies and broadcast your solutions and personal visions.

We will channel your story, along with other women’s stories from around the world, to major media outlets, advocacy groups, policy-makers, and key international forums to ensure that your voice is heard through the halls of power.

In addition to our global campaign, we are launching our first ever regional focus—a highlight on the Democratic Republic of Congo—to engage and spotlight Congolese women’s experiences, solutions, and visions for a new, peaceful Congo with women at the helm.

Democratic Republic of Congo – One Woman’s Story
Arguably the worst region in the world for women, the DRC is also one of the most silenced due to the lack of communications infrastructure. World Pulse is committed to collecting and broadcasting the stories of Congolese women. Hear from these courageous women and support their visions for change!

After soldiers targeted her daughter, Neema contemplates a radical and miraculous response: love.

It was 7pm when my phone rang. The streets were pitch black except for the cell phone lights that guide one’s way when walking in my area. On the other end of the line was my 24-year-old daughter, crying uncontrollably. Minutes ago, I had asked her to pick up a phone card for me and she had set out to the kiosk at the end of our little road. At the kiosk, a soldier had come up behind her and beat her profusely.

When my daughter returned home, she was shaken and bruised but okay. I was relieved, but my thoughts were aflame. A brave friend went back into that dark night to investigate what had happened. We learned there was not one but two soldiers who conspired to attack my daughter. After she finished paying at the kiosk, she heard them say behind her, “Let’s beat this girl. Yeah, we won’t let her pass.” She was struck in the face while the other slapped her so hard it knocked her to the ground. The beating continued until finally the man at the kiosk intervened. At that point, the two assailants turned their attentions to the man who tried to protect my daughter, but the group of men who had gathered around the kiosk took action and scared them off.

How is a mother supposed to act in a situation like this? This act of violence against my precious daughter was random, committed by two who had supposedly given their lives to the service of safety. How am I to feel about these soldiers? Am I to vent all my emotion toward them and desire just punishment? Am I to blame the other boys standing by who let these men beat my daughter, but then valiantly defended their male friend? Am I to hate them, hate their parents? Isn’t this hatred, this violence, the very thing that has been bred into our culture and rooted in the very fabric of our society?

Then I asked myself: What would affect the outcome I would hope to realize? And surprisingly, the answer back to myself was: A Miracle.

Just a moment before I had been feeling hopeless and impotent, caught in a net of evil in a sea of ruined hearts and minds. But now, rays of hope began to replace the desperate cry within me. Fear and panic dissipated as an odd feeling of peace flooded my being. I was feeling a field of immunity come over me, as if all the strands of corrupted nature that had found me, trapped, and imprisoned me were suddenly no longer able to hold me. It was not that I was stronger, but that I had become of a different nature; one for which those cords had no effect. My mind had been seized, but now I was free!

And what was the nature of the miracle that had transformed me? Love.

It sounds trite to say it. As I see the words on the screen, I’m almost embarrassed to continue. But instantly I recognize that’s the old mind and not the new trying to trap me again in a prison mentality. Why am I afraid to speak about love and forgiveness? Why is it easier to talk about how we’ve been victimized and abused? And who is my audience when I go on like that but those who have also been caught in that net of evil. And is there any end to that line? That victimized chorus would sing for eternity.

I thought about those soldiers. What caused them to pick my daughter at random? It suddenly seemed to me that these were minds that were little different from the one I had: minds that see everyone and everything as separate from themselves. In my case, I am continually being victimized. I am always on the defensive, watching out for those ruthless takers who are always trying to take advantage of me. Certainly these soldiers had been in my shoes before, suffering how I have suffered. So now, they have vowed never to be victims again. They’ve seen that the world is full of takers and those being taken. Given these choices, they have decided to become takers. This whole line of logic is a problem. The idea that there are takers and those who are taken may be the fundamental problem afflicting the whole world.

To my surprise, I am now seeing through a mind that wants to embrace those soldiers, love those soldiers, care for those soldiers. I know this sounds crazy, but I am experiencing something within—something life changing. How do I communicate that? I’m experiencing something. I want to meet those soldiers, sit down with them, and have a conversation. I want to explain to them what I’m now seeing. In effect, I want to be their eyes for a moment to show them my new viewpoint.

This incident has made this fact so clear to me. If I love them, they will feel love, and if I don’t, they may not. And if they loved me, or more specifically, if they loved my daughter, they would never think of harming her. These young men are brothers to my daughter, and she their sister. These soldiers are my sons, and I their mother. Shouldn’t I as their mother sit down and speak with them about this matter, heart to heart?

Does this thinking sound fanciful to you? It may. It probably would have sounded fanciful to me yesterday morning. But today I’m feeling liberated from a mind that continually held me captive to governing thoughts tailored to keep me subject to schemes that victimized me, that kept me afraid, skeptical, and poor.

What’s interesting is that with this new mind, I can see that everyone else somehow inherently knows this too. It’s just that we’ve suffered under the burden of an oppressive interpretation of all of our bad experiences. Instead of suggesting love and forgiveness, instead of suggesting dialog and interaction, that old mind taught us to fear, separate, reject, and avenge.

I am going to go meet those boys. I want them to know that I think of them as my sons and that I love them. I may scold them as any loving mother would, but they will feel my love and know that I am scolding them because I love them and have embraced them as my sons, and that I think and expect better of them. They may reject my loving embrace, but that will not stop my love. And I know they will remember. You can’t forget a mother’s love.

And my daughter? Well she’s their sister, and she’s going with me.

May there still be suffering ahead? More than likely, yes. But that suffering will no longer imprison me as it did before. It will become my soapbox to liberate another, perhaps a multitude of others, perhaps even the one being used to “net” me. For I see that he and I are together, and he needs me. He needs my love, that he too may be freed.

Neema

Visit our new Campaigns page to read submissions from other community members and to find out how you can participate and be heard today!