Brothers, 

The fraternity’s leadership is calling on its members to--both individually and collectively--bring attention to the issue by conducting at least one project this month that brings awareness to the issue of domestic violence.  In addition the fraternity’s chapters are being asked to make financial contributions to organizations that work to prevent domestic violence.

Mason has appointed Alpha brother Kevin Powell to head up the fraternity’s month-long participation. Powell, a member of the fraternity’s Kappa Xi Lambda Chapter in New York, is an activist and author (Open Letters to America, which includes the essay, “Open Letter to An American Woman”) and has offered seven things that people can do to bring about greater awareness:

1) Turn your Facebook profile or Twitter avatar PURPLE, and encourage everyone in your social network to do the same, for the entire month of October. October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and PURPLE is the international color for domestic violence. OR wear a PURPLE ribbon or something PURPLE throughout the month of October.
 
2) Create a domestic violence awareness forum in your community, at your spiritual/religious institution, at your workplace, or at your school, so that you and others, females and males alike, can talk freely about domestic violence, and ways to end it. If you need literature for your gathering, please visit http://www.ndvh.org/resources/resource-download-center/
to download great material.

3) Share his two essays with males in your community, be they nonviolent males or former abusers, since men and boys are more likely to abuse women and girls rather than the other way around:

• “Ending Violence Against Women and Girls”
• “Men Can Stop Domestic Violence”
Both essays can be found at www.kevinpowell.net.

Still not convinced, visit this site to get critical statistics about who is most likely to be a victim of domestic violence in America: http://endabuse.org/content/action_center/detail/754.

4) Contact your local domestic violence agency or battered women’s shelter to see if you can volunteer your time. There may be special events where extra hands are needed during October. But you should consider volunteering at any time of year. Domestic violence happens every single day in America.

5) Tweet or retweet a link to an article or blog entry about domestic violence. Use Facebook, Digg, Linked-In, and other social networking sites to help promote articles about Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

6) If you or someone you know has been the victim of domestic violence, PLEASE ENCOURAGE them to get help in the form of counseling, support groups, reading material, etc. AND PLEASE CALL the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1−800−799−SAFE (7233) or TTY 1−800−787−3224 if you or someone you know needs assistance or guidance immediately.

7) If you are still not clear on what domestic violence is, please go to this link to get the basic definition: http://www.ndvh.org/get-educated/what-is-domestic-violence/

PLEASE share this definition with others, especially women and girls, since women and girls are the most likely group to be the victims of domestic violence. 

As a show of support for those most in need, the fraternity’s chapters and members in the East and Midwest will make minimum donations of $50 to the Witney Lights fund via that organization’s Web site:  www.witneyslights.com/Donate.html. Witney's Lights is a domestic-violence awareness group named after the late Dr. Witney Holland Rose, a University of Maryland psychiatrist who was murdered in 2003 by her ex-boyfriend.

In the Southern, Southwest and Western states, brothers will make donations of $50 to the Men Stopping Violence organization at: www.menstoppingviolence.org/GetInvolved/donate/donate.php. This group is an Atlanta-area based social change organization dedicated to ending men's violence against women.

If men don’t stand up for stopping violence against women and girls, who will?

 

Herman "Skip" Mason, Jr.

General President

Attention chapter secretary: Please  print and present this email during your next chapter meeting.

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