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Thursday, February 29, 2024
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Please Speak Out: DV/FV awareness during Ochre Ribbon Week By SHARON BONTHUYS EVERYONE can speak out about the scourge of domestic and family violence (DV, FV) but only government has the power to regulate to make change. This was the message delivered at a lunch in Narromine earlier this month in support of Ochre Ribbon Week, held annually each February to raise awareness of the impacts of domestic and family violence in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. Although DV and FV occurs in all cultures and across all socio-economic groups and genders, it is a well-documented fact that these forms of violence are higher in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. Keynote speaker Ashlee Donohue, author, consultant, victim-survivor advocate and CEO of Mudgin-Gal Aboriginal Women’s Centre in Sydney, said everyone has the capacity to make their communities and homes safe. “We aren’t doing that enough but we have that power,” she
Ashlee Donohue addresses the Ochre Ribbon Week lunch in Narromine on February 15. PHOTOS: NARROMINE STAR.
told those attending the lunch. “The government is never going to save us.” A proud Aboriginal woman from the Dunghutti nation who was born and raised in Kempsey, Ms Donohue shared part of her own harrowing personal experience with DV, which she has written about. Her book “Because I Love Him” will be published by Magabala Books in the near future. Ms Donohue recounted the horrific personal experience featured in her book of being severely beaten by a former partner while multiple bystanders stood by and did nothing to help during or after the attack. “Not one person thought to ring the police or ambulance. “We need to get out to community that [DV and FV] is everybody’s business and keep the conversations going until people start addressing it.” Ms Donohue said governments wrote the laws, the policies and determined the enforcements, some of which could not be used in DV and FV situations. She cited the king-hit law in NSW as an example. “It can’t be used in DV cases. The victim has to be a stranger and the perpetrator under the influence of alcohol,” she said. Continued page 3
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