7 News Belize

Spreading The Word On Gender Awareness
posted (November 24, 2015)
Everyone knows that when you go to a barber shop or salon, you'll leave with a new refreshed look but you also leave with a whooole lot of updates on gossip and I mean - surely, on that chatter list you won't find pressing social or national issues. But the coordinators at YWCA want to change that. Today YWCA held a gender based violence workshop for barbers and beauticians from Belize City and Belmopan. The main idea is for them to translate the information and awareness they get from this workshop to their personal and professional life. We found out how it works:

Shellon Nunez, Coordinator
"It's the 16 days of activism and so the YWCA has managed to garner some funds through the "Step it up" program. The "Step it up" program is a program that is run throughout 4 Caribbean countries and we have decided that we were going to target barbers and beauticians specifically for today and other women in the community that have been affected or are prone to violence against women."

Courtney Weatherburne
"Tell us about the choice of inviting barbers and beautician. It's interesting. Usually when we hear about gender base violence, its women and young girls. Tell us why you are targeting barbers and beauticians?"

Shellon Nunez, Coordinator
"We decided to target barbers and beauticians because we have run programs for them already here at the Y under a different program. But we invited them specifically for this program because we wanted the information to be disseminated. And so we decided that if we target barbers and beauticians, you know when you go to the hair dresser there is a lot of conversations - when you go to the barber there is a lot of conversations. So we wanted them to talk about violence against women and how it can be prevented and so we decide that we are going to target them so that the information can be disseminated and those who get the information can talk to their peers."

"The importance of this conference is to stop violence against women. That's what we want them to take away and we want them to really think about how they can impact the people that they come across. I have said earlier that barbers and beauticians, they have a lot of people coming through their businesses and we want them to really target these people and let them know that it's important for them to stop violence against women."

Sandra Diaz Cadle, Counsellor, Edward P York High School
"Quite honestly you can never get tired of creating awareness and advocating against violence and I know you mentioned women, but we need to also bear in mind that when we talk about gender base violence, sometimes men are affected too. So we are hoping through these workshops to sensitize the entire public to gender base violence and how it impacts sustainable development. Because we need to remember that our young people are the future and so we need to ensure that the environment remains healthy for them."

Jack Martinez, Dale's Barber Sop
"Well it's the first time to a workshop like this. It's something very good. It will teach you more or less how to deal with violence in terms of females being abused in the neighborhood. Sometimes you see things happened and you don't know where to go, who to go with."

Courtney Weatherburne
"Tell us what you learned from this workshop you translate to your personal life and as well as your professional life?"

Jack Martinez, Dale's Barber Sop
"Professional life: it's going to develop me a lot because I can tell you sometimes you see things and you don't know how to deal with it."

"Baber shop is social place where people come and speak about their life and what's not and sometimes they bring this up and you don't know what to tell them. So with this workshop now, I can be able to tell them more or less where to go and who to talk to."

20 barbers and beauticians attended. There will also be another session this afternoon at 3:30 for young women and girls. The barbers and beauticians will be given shirts and flyers to give to their customers.

Home | Archives | Downloads/Podcasts | Advertise | Contact Us

7 News Belize