Saskatchewan is launching new public awareness campaign aimed at getting people to speak out against sexual violence and abuse of women.
The “Who will you help?” campaign is essentially a revamp of an Ontario program. It features a video that will be airing on Facebook, YouTube, television and movie theatres.
The video depicts uncomfortable and unsettling scenes of men taking advantage of women in different situations, with no one speaking out for the victims.
Premier Brad Wall says the campaign is aimed at young people.
“In terms of changing attitudes, we have to start young,” he said. “We know what the statistics are. Predominately we have to talk to young men, to our sons, if in the long term we are going to change attitudes.”
Dianna Graves is the executive director of Sexual Assault Services of Saskatchewan. She has been spending a lot of time in the north, looking at the unique challenges faced by women in remote areas.
She says the findings are disturbing:
“That it is very high, that it is normalized, that people don’t talk about it… the long time it takes to get through the judicial system, and the shame that’s associated with it. It’s just silence – people don’t want to talk about it so we can’t solve something.”
Graves is working on a needs assessment for remote and northern communities. It should be complete by about the end of the year.
Since the #WhoWillYouHelpSK campaign launched on the Sask. Government website a few days ago, there have been about 160,000 hits and more than a thousand shares.
To watch the full video, follow this link.