Another successful Annual Family Violence Awareness Dinner

Whitecourt’s 5^th Annual Family Violence Awareness Dinner took place on October 6, and it was a much-needed event. Late last year, Andrea Silverstone, co-chair of the Calgary Domestic Violence Collective, says calls to her agency had spiked by 40 per cent. The reason? The economy. Job loss, layoffs, dwindling savings and the stress of trying to stay afloat in a sinking economy has left already frustrated Albertans with much shorter fuses, and when those fuses blow, people get hurt.

The Alberta Council of Women’s Shelters’ Annual Provincial Shelter Data (data collected from April 2015 – March 2016) reports that 5,148 women and 5,149 children where sheltered during that time frame, with 8,076 women and 8,283 children turned away from shelter due to lack of capacity.

However, it’s not just women that are victims of family and domestic abuse. According to a study from Statistics Canada, “the likelihood of a man being the victim of abuse by his female partner is almost the same as it is for a woman” but sadly, archaic attitudes about reporting female on male abuse, along with a lack of readily accessible programs for men, prevent many men from reaching out for help.

These were some of the issues brought to light by the Family Violence Awareness Dinner, which featured guest speaker Jeffery Bucholtz. Bucholtz is the president of the San Diego Domestic Violence Council and is the co-director of a social business he launched called We End Violence. Through these initiatives, and through speaking and touring engagements like the one in Whitecourt last week, Bucholtz brings awareness to the issues surrounding violence in relationships, staking, bullying and more.

Last week’s Family Violence Awareness Dinner was a great way to remind everyone in the community about the violence that takes place behind closed doors, and a wonderful way to empower and inform those that need help. If you need any proof to know that these types of sessions work, you’ll be pleased to know that the numbers reported from the Alberta Council of Women’s Shelters were lower than last year!  Information, empowerment and awareness are key factors in shutting down family violence.