During the evening, while many raised their glasses to bridge past initiatives with those to come, others played baby-foot, or indulged in tarot reading sessions. Nevertheless, the highlight of the evening was SoliRose’s intense and moving live ceremonial performance. 

“SoliRose – whose core members are Samia Abou-Samra and Nia Witherspoon – is an emerging ceremonial music venture which seeks to enact home/culture-making in Diaspora by calling on the power of the ancestral lines, and the lands that shaped them. With explicit influences from Lebanon/the Levant, Turkey, North and West Africa, and Flamenco, SoliRose, named after Samia and Nia’s grandmothers and great-grandmothers, seeks to recombine the diversity of musical styles in a way that organically reflects their actual crossings, in both the old world and in the new.”

Where sexism, racism, heteronormativity, and classism often pass as the norm, Nasawiya’s new space is a beam of light that looks promising enough to embrace feminists in a vibrant atmosphere of activism.

With Nasawiya’s bright feminists, we trust that the revolution can only go forth.

For more info please contact Farah at farah@nasawiya.org!

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Nasawiya is now located on Chahrouri Street, Braidi Building, 1st Floor, Facing “Laure Mghayzel High-School for Girls” – Ashrafieh.

By: Shant (www.bekhsoos.com)

كان يا ما كان نهار الأربعاء الماضي الواقع في 19 آب/أغسطس، استضافت “المجموعة النسوية” في بيتها الجديد الواقع في منطقة الأشرفية – شارع الشحروري، العاملة الاجتماعية “عبير مزهر”* للحديث عن “آليات حماية المرأة من العنف الزوجي”.

بدأت الندوة عند الساعة السادسة والنصف بحضور عدد من النسويات والنسويين، وتناول عرض الباوربوينت الذي أعدته “عبير” المحاور التالية: وقاية المرأة من العنف الزوجي (توعية وقوانين) – التدخل (مكان آمن – تطبيق قوانين – تعويضات).

وأكدت “عبير” في المحور الأول على ضرورة خلق بيئة رافضة للعنف من خلال:

أولا، التوعية الاجتماعية عن ماهية العنف وأشكاله المختلفة (مدارس، شرطة، أطباء، عاملين في الحقل الاجتماعي والطبي والأمني والقضائي، النساء المعنفات، انشاء خط ساخن للابلاغ عن الحالات).

وثانيا، سن القوانين الحامية للمرأة التي تصنف العنف كجريمة وليس كمسألة شخصية كما هو الحال حاليا في لبنان وعدد كبير من الدول العربية، وتسهيل عمليات الابلاغ عن جرائم العنف من قبل الأطباء والشرطة والعامة.

كذلك تحدثت “عبير” عن آلية التعاطي مع حالات العنف عبر الخطوات التالية: حجز الشريك العنيف – نقل المرأة المعنفة الى مكان آمن (والأولاد في حال وجودهم) – تطبيق القوانين. وأسهبت في الحديث عن الملاجئ السرية التي يتم ايواء المرأة فيها بعيدا عن الشريك العنيف الى حين المحاكمة أو ايجاد حلول لها، مؤكدة على طابع العمل النسوي لهذه الملاجئ، حيث يتم تشجيع المرأة على العمل والقيام بالنشاطات لتكون منتجة بدلا من عاطلة عن العمل، ولتشعر بقدرتها على اتخاذ قراراتها الشخصية حتى لو كان القرار أن تعود الى شريكها العنيف.

وقالت “عبير” أن المحاكمة تتم على أساس نوع ودرجة العنف (جسدي، كلامي، ديني، نفسي، جنسي…)، ويصدر الحكم على الشريك العنيف بناء على ذلك اما بالسجن أو الخدمة العامة الاجتماعية أو باطلاق سراح مشروط أو حرمان من الحضانة أو متابعة نفسية وادخاله برنامج السيطرة على الغضب. لكنها لفتت الى أن 80 الى 90% من الرجال العنيفين لا يغيرون سلوكهم العنيف بالرغم من تعرضهم لهذه العقوبات.

كذلك أشارت “عبير” الى أن 95 % من حالات العنف تكون من قبل الرجل ضد المرأة، فيما 5% تكون العكس، كما لفتت الى أن الشريكين قد يكونان من جندرين مختلفين أو مماثلين (مغايري/ات الجنس أو مثليي/ات الجنس).

“نسوية” تتوجه بالشكر العميق ل”عبير” على هذه الندوة الشيقة والممتعة، وتتمنى تعاونا قريبا مشتركا!

ملاحظة: عرض “باوربوينت” جاهز للتحميل لمن يرغب/ترغب.

Abeer’s talk centered around the mechanisms to protect women from partner violence. She stressed on the difference between using the terms domestic, family and conjugal violence.

Abeer’s power point presentation included discussion on preventive measures for violence, intervention methods, awareness versus laws, compensations, and more.

Abeer focused on the need to create a violence free space through:
- Awareness about violence and its different forms.
- Classification of violence as a crime, and not as a personal issue that ought to be addressed differently, as it is in lebanon and a big section of the Arab world,
- Training doctors and police me/women  in a way to help them realize the dangers of violence to be able to report it properly.

Abeer also talked about the process in which conjugal violence is being applied:
- Taking the violent partner to jail.
- Taking the woman directly to a safe space, and the kids, in case there were any.
- How the laws are applied.

Abeer then moved on to discuss the secret centers where women are taken in, away from the violent partner until there is a trial, or finding solution for the situation,
stressing on the feminist approach of having these centers, by empowering woman to fight and protect themselves against violence, and eventually become productive 
and empowered instead of jobless, so they can feel the power to be independent even if the decision has to do with their violent partner.

Abeer as well talked about the trials and the level of violence in which the level of verdict is decided upon, either by sending him to jail or by sentencing him for public social work,
or restriction order, or deprivation of custody, or a counseling follow up through anger management classes. It is worth noting that more than 80 to 90% of violent partners do not change
their violent behavior or abuse, but find their ways around into giving it different shapes, even after facing their first sentences.

Abeer also mentioned that based on statistics, 95% of conjugal violence, is from men to women, male to female partner, while only 5% of partner violence is woman against partner or male against other male partners.
 
Nasawiya would like to deeply thank Abeer for her impressive, educative, and pleasurable talk and hope for further cooperation. The power point presentation can be uploaded upon request and is in Arabic.

The video was produced for our training program “Ghayreh 3adtik Bitzeed S3adtik – Feminist Tools for Change” which aims at empowering women with the knowledge, tools and resources to bring about change from a feminist perspective.

The message of the video is simple: Change is possible. We just have to work on it.

If you’d like to us to take the training program to your university, school, organization or group, please write to farah[at]nasawiya.org.

Primarily targeted at young women, the objective of the program is to provide them with the knowledge, tools and resources on organizing for change, be it by undertaking legal reform, grassroots pressure, building a community, raising awareness, creating support groups, or running for public office – all from a feminist perspective.

To help us promote the program, we’re developing a poster campaign. We’re looking for women aged 18 – 40 years with expressive faces to front the campaign. We’re looking for women who’d be able to express a wide range of emotions such as joy, sadness, fear, anger, surprise, anticipation, sadness, disappointment, awe, and frustration.

If you’d like to take part in one of our photo shoots, please email farah@nasawiya.org, attaching a portrait of yourself.

To vote for your favorite feminist slogans, kindly tick no more than 8 choices. We’re planning to produce 4 T-Shirts, 2 bags and 2 stickers (equally divided between Arabic and English).

Voting closes Friday, July 9, 2010.

Slogans can be in English, Arabic (colloquial or classical) or French. You can send as many as you can think of.

We’ll choose the catchiest ones and print them on our T-Shirts.

So, yalla, put your creative thinking caps on and post your slogans in the below comment box.

The comments will be closed on Friday, 18 June 2010.

• Global Fund for Women Condemns Israeli Attack on Freedom Flotilla
• Nobel Women’s Initiative condemns Gaza flotilla attack
• MADRE Condemns Israel’s Killing of Activists Bringing Humanitarian Aid to Gaza
• Women for Women’s Human Rights condemns the violence and offensive policies employed by the Israeli state
• CODEPINK Condemns Israeli Attack on Gaza Flotilla
• Aswat-Palestinian Queer Women Condemns Israel’s Raid on Gaza Aid Flotilla
• Association for Women in Development (AWID) Condemns Israeli Attack on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla (Read the statement in French and Spanish.)

We are taking our training program “Ghayreh 3adtik Bitzeed S3adtik” – Feminist Tools for Change to the road.

After sessions in International College (IC), Saint Joseph University (USJ) – Engineering Faculty (ESIB), Union of Municipalities of Tyre, American University of Beirut (AUB) – Faculty of Health Sciences and scouts group in Harissa, we’re talking to the Secular Club at AUB, a youth group in Tyre and students at the Lebanese American University (LAU).

If you’d like us to bring this training program on gender justice and feminism for social change to your schools, universities, groups, community centers or organizations, call 70 066 880 or write to farah[at]nasawiya.org.

The sessions are free of charge and can accommodate groups of 20 persons and up, depending on the setting and the facilities. The sessions can be given in English, Arabic or French, depending on your choice. The program primarily targets women, but men are welcome too.

What are you waiting for? Jump on the bandwagon and contact us.

Taking place on 25 April 2010, the Laïque Pride march represents a sincere initiative by citizens who would like to have a direct relationship with the state, without a mediator in between. Secularism in a country as diverse as Lebanon represents true coexistence, while the current sectarian system represents a crisis.

Women’s interest in a secular state goes in parallel with their struggle for equality, justice and full citizenship. Women’s call for a secular state goes hand in hand with the demands for protection from family and gender-based violence. Secularism allows women to be emancipated from sectarian laws that effect their lives and choices, including marriage, inheritance, and custody among other issues.

We call upon all concerned citizens, women’s rights NGOs, women from all sects and religions, and women of conforming and non-conforming sexualities to march with us in the Nasawiya feminist block, as we demand a secular state in Lebanon.

For more information on how to join us, contact us on 01-447 192 or write to farah[at]nasawiya.org.

For more information on Laïque Pride, see the event’s Facebook Page.