Women killed by violence were honoured in a candlelight vigil on Wednesday, May 5, where Newcastle locals took a stand against domestic violence and remembered loved ones lost.
Underneath the tram sheds in Foreshore Park hung 150 dresses representing the women killed by violence; some dresses carried names, ages and stories, some were unnamed, and others represented children.
The Newcastle vigil was one of many held across Australia in line with Domestic Violence Prevention Month.
The event was supported by Nova for Women and Children, the Newcastle Domestic Violence Committee, Warlga Ngurra Women and Children’s Refuge, Jenny’s Place, and the Gender Research Network (GRN) at the University of Newcastle.
GRN Project Officer Rachel Bond said 11 women in Australia had been killed by violence this year, with 10 of those women murdered by men they had known.
Their names were read aloud at the vigil, including baby Kobi Shepherdson, tragically killed by her father in a murder-suicide last month.
“Domestic abuse impacts everyone in the community; I think with the current figures, it’s less and less likely that there isn’t somebody in your life that has suffered from domestic abuse—or violence against women,” Bond said.
“We want everyone to take a stand and say this violence has to stop; this violence is not okay.”
Bond said more than 100 people attended the vigil, which included poem reading, speakers from frontline services, and an indigenous smoking ceremony that cleansed the dresses— reigniting them with a new spirit.
Newcastle feminist collective AWE initially created the white dresses for the “Remember the women” installation in 2016.
The dresses were displayed in public spaces, symbolising women that had been killed that year.
This evolved into an ongoing campaign led by different groups every year, including Hunter TAFE in 2017, Walk A Mile Koori Style in 2018, and the Gender Research Network in 2019.
GRN Director and vigil emcee Trisha Pender said the dresses individualised each woman and ensured that their life was not reduced to a statistic.
“The dresses you see around you were made to remember the life of an individual woman, and as you can see, there are far, far, far too many of them,” Pender said.
“This event came about because we are sick and tired of mourning the women who die in domestic and family violence each year—it’s not just those lives which are lost, but those who are still fighting and those who have survived.
“Staff at Warlga Ngurra suggested taking these dresses to Canberra and making this project national.
“So that’s what we are going to do; on May the 24th, we will be taking these dresses to Parliament House and making our government listen; we invite everyone to join us.”
Rachel Bond said the first step to reducing domestic violence was criminalising coercive control and educating the police, the judiciary, and the community on these behaviours.
“Some instances women think because they aren’t physically abused, then they aren’t experiencing domestic abuse, but coercive control is just as damaging and can be a red flag for domestic homicide,” Bond said.
“So, in Hannah Clarke’s case, from what we know, there was no history of physical violence, so that first act of violence was the horrendous final act.
“Criminalising coercive control is a step in the right direction, to help protect women and to educate the public.”
She said Newcastle needed more housing as well as more funding to women’s refuges and frontline domestic violence services.
“All the services here in Newcastle are at full capacity, they are screaming out for longer-term funding, they shouldn’t have to keep applying for money on a short time basis, if they had secure funding, they would be able to help more women,” Bond said.
“We are also in a housing crisis; after these women have initially fled, and there is nothing available on the rental market or in public housing, where are these women meant to go?
“It’s devastating to think we can live in Australia, which is such a wealthy nation, but we cannot provide something as basic as housing—both federal and state governments need to step up and address this.”
For the past three years, the University of Newcastle’s Gender Research Network has held public talks, candlelight vigils, and hosted webinars to help raise awareness for domestic violence.
Additionally, they also organise the Newcastle event for the global campaign ‘16 Days of Activism to End Violence Against Women’, which runs annually from November 25 to December 10.
Hayley McMahon