The William Smith

Women’s Collective

 

Take Back The Night 2005

On Thursday, October 27th the William Smith Women’s Collective will sponsor Take Back the Night, a march open to the HWS and Geneva communities to protest against violence towards women.

           Take Back the Night is an international event which started in Germany in 1973 to protest violent crimes against women.  It spread to the US in 1978 when the first march occurred in San Francisco. Take Back the Night has grown stronger since, spreading to many college campuses across the country. The march’s name is given because the night is often a time when it is considered unsafe for a woman to walk alone.

           This year’s march on the HWS campus starts on the steps of Smith Hall at 9:30 pm as an all female statement of strength and commitment, and winds throughout campus and into downtown Geneva. The march then loops back around to Hamilton and Pultney St., where at 10:30 pm Hobart men are invited to join us at the Hobart and William Smith sign as a symbol of the commitment by the men of Hobart to recognize this issue, and to work side by side with the William Smith women to remedy it.

From the sign at 5&20 we will light candles and proceed down to the quad where a candlelight vigil and speak-out will be held. Throughout the march, white carnations will be laid down at specific places where domestic violence or violence against women has occurred.

The Women’s Collective would like to invite all members of the HWS and Geneva communities to come out with us on this important night, and to remain afterwards to participate in the vigil.  It is only with the help of everyone that we will ever truly be able to “take back the night.”

 

 

Mer Trainor 2003