How can gender-based violence be recognized?

Another training on combating gender-based violence in the frames of the project "Peacebuilding and Conflict Resolution in Ukraine - Step Forward" was implemented together with trainers Olena Sudakova and Olesia Druzhyna. Ambiguous and debatable aspects of this negative phenomenon were highlighted during the four days. Special attention of participants was drawn to how exactly violence can and cannot be classified.

A lot of attention is paid to this topic in the information field and, at the same time, the peculiarities of the legislative interpretation of GBV and its perception by ordinary citizens are quite different, this collectively affects the work of specialists in this topic. After all, the terminological gap and the possibility of identifying gradations make it difficult to work with those affected.

Trainers prepared cases that clearly demonstrate people's loyalty to manifestations of violence to be studied during the training, for example, through publications on social networks, announcements in public places, as well as tolerance through the culture of jokes and sarcastic statements.

Thus, such examples evoked various emotions in the group members: shock, indignation, surprise, interest, confusion and so on. In the end it resulted in a discussion that continued even outside of the training.

As a conclusion, it should be noted that despite there are many educational measures on this topic being held, society still remains afraid of terms like "sexism", "misogyny", "mansplaining"... They are more used by specialists, and ordinary citizens tend to hold an opinion that "that’s always been this way", "that’s women's own fault", "it was just a joke". That is why we continue our work in this direction, as our trainers say: "The fish will be the last to discover the water".

The event was held in the frames of the "Peace Building and Conflict Resolution in Ukraine – Step Forward" project, implemented with the support of the German Federal Foreign Office’s funds by IFA (Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen), Funding programme zivik.