V-Day is a global activist movement to end violence against women and girls that raises funds and awareness through benefit productions of playwright/founder Eve Ensler’s award-winning play The Vagina Monologues and other artistic works. The V stands for Victory, Valentine and Vagina. In 2012, over 5,800 V-Day benefit events, produced by volunteer activists, took place around the world, educating millions about the reality of violence against women and girls.
To date, the V-Day movement has raised over $90 million and educated millions about the issue of violence against women and the efforts to end it, crafted educational media resources and public service announcement campaigns, reopened shelters, and funded over 14,000 community-based anti-violence programs and safe houses in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, Kenya, South Dakota, Egypt and Iraq.
Over 300 million people have seen a V-Day benefit event in their community. V-Day’s newest campaign is One Billion Rising.
In 2011, Ashlee Donohue and Dixie Link-Gordon from Mudgin-Gal Aboriginal Corporation Women’s Centre had the pleasure of meeting Eve Ensler. Through a conversation with Eve, Mudgin-Gal quickly organised to become a part of this movement. Mudgin-Gal wanted to highlight and bring to the fore in a respectful, healing way the issues that we face within our community here in the inner city, as well as throughout the communities we come from. Our staff members here at Mudgin-Gal are from a diverse background of Clans/Language Groups/Communities.
The day was an absolute success, starting out with a smoking ceremony to welcome everyone and ourselves to the space where we would be dancing. Then the first strike took place and it was both unifying and moving, for someone like myself who is new to this area of work. It was nearly two days before I was able to process it properly and allow my emotions and my heart to catch up with what we’d been a part of. For those who participated, it was an amazing experience.
V-Day brings opportunity to educate and heal, and that was our intention in conducting our V-Day event in the space of the National Centre of Indigenous Excellence (NCIE).
Mudgin-Gal is committed to being a part of this movement, serving and engaging our community.
