– December 6th is the National Day to Mobilize Men to End Violence against Women.
On December 6, 1989, Marc Lepine, aged 25, broke into a classroom at the Polytechnic School, in the city of Montreal, Canada, armed. He ordered the 48 men present to leave the room, leaving only the women in the room. Shouting “You are all feminists!”, the young man shot and murdered 14 women, at point blank range. Then he committed suicide. In a letter left by him, he justified his action by saying that he could not bear the idea of women studying Engineering, a course traditionally aimed at men.
The crime mobilized public opinion across the country, generating broad debate about inequalities between men and women and the violence generated by this social imbalance. Thus, a group of men from Canada decided to organize themselves to say that there are men who commit violence against women, but there are also those who repudiate this violence. They chose the white ribbon as their symbol and adopted their motto: never commit a violent act against women and never close their eyes to this violence.
They thus launched the first White Ribbon Campaign: men to end violence against women. During the first year of the Campaign, around 100,000 ties were distributed among Canadian men, mainly between November 25th and December 6th, a week that saw a series of public actions and demonstrations in favor of women's rights, for the end of violence. November 25th was proclaimed by UNIFEM – United Nations Development Fund for Women, as International Day for the Eradication of Violence against Women. December 6th was chosen so that the deaths of those women (and the machismo that generated them) would not be forgotten.
The Brazilian White Ribbon Campaign aims to raise awareness, involve and mobilize men to work towards ending violence against women. Its activities are developed in line with the actions of organized women's movements and other social representations that seek to promote gender equity, through actions in health, education, work, social action, justice, public safety and human rights.
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