Take Back the Night week offers panels, screenings and annual march to end and educate on violence.
It’s time for Ohio University students and Athens residents to take back the night.
Planned by the Women’s Commission of Student Senate, Take Back the Night week aims to end sexual assault and violence and educate through events during the week of April 13 to 17.
Last year was the first inclusionary march that the week had seen at OU, where men, women and non-binary individuals could participate in the march. Traditionally, the march had been open to only women. This march will continue to be inclusionary this year, said Madison Koenig, women’s affairs commissioner and a senior studying English.
“We have tagline for the week of events which is ‘the first step to ending violence is ending silence,’” Koenig said.
Along with being inclusionary, the march also is for “all survivors of power-based personal violence, including bullying, sexual assault, dating and domestic violence, race based discrimination, police brutality, colonialism and classism” according to its poster.
“The feedback that we got from a lot of people is we really can’t go back from that, but we wanted to frame (it)… as an opportunity to build alliances between different oppressed groups because I think I that one of the really good things this event can do is gets a lot of people out there,” Koenig said. “The more people we can have involved in that process, the more visible we can be, the more awareness we can raise.”
Koenig made an extra effort to involve the Athens area in the planning and conversation around what Take Back the Night week should look like, organizing discussions throughout the year.
“I think these events are going to be a good representation of what people in and out of the Athens community said that they need,” Koenig said.
Delfin Bautista, director of the LGBT Center, said it’s important to involve the community and appreciates the march continuing to be inclusive as it was last year. Bautista said at one point during conversations, there was an idea to do two separate marches. Bautista said there is value in inclusive space but for “safety” and “solidarity” there is also value in identity-specific spaces.
The march will occur at 8 p.m. on Thursday, and will follow a keynote speech by Sil Lai Abrams, a National Association of Black Journalists award-winning writer. She is also a domestic awareness violence activist and an inspirational speaker, according to her website.
Koenig said there would still be sideline support as part of the march. Those who want to be a part of sideline support can show up at the time of the march and meet up, or contact Chris Caldwell at caldwelc1@ohio.edu.
On Friday at 3 p.m., Cheryl Cesta will be hosting a self-defense workshop at the Athens Public Library.
“Our bodies can be a weapon and it’s more than physical fighting back, it’s mind and attitude and being assertive and expressing your rights and your preferences, so there’s a lot more to self-defense than just kicking and punching,” Cesta said. “A lot of it is verbal skills and awareness skills.”
Cesta said she has been a part of Take Back the Night since she moved here in the ’80s.
“It’s really … empowering to march and chant and verbally and physically put yourself out there for a cause like ending … interpersonal violence.”
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