GMADA: Men For HAWC

ACTION GUIDE

HOME PAGE
Men for HAWC
Parade
Billboard
Playhouse
Domestic Violence - Free Zone
Frequently Asked Questions
Breaking Our Silence Video
GMADA's Approach
Other Men's Initiatives
Bumperstickers, T-shirts & More
Press Coverage
If You Need Help
Links
Contact Us
Business Statement
Text Version

MEN FOR HAWC
Our local battered women’s agency is called HAWC (Help for Abused Women and their Children). It serves 23 cities and towns northeast of Boston. With a staff of about 30 women, HAWC operates a shelter, 24 hour hotlines, a large volunteer program, offices in Salem, Lynn and Gloucester, services in English, Spanish and Portuguese, and many support groups and individual counseling services, as well as teen reach programs in area schools. In the average year HAWC has over 11,000 contacts with women in need of services. Countless women, men and children can testify to the dedicated and professional way HAWC has served their families during its more than 20 year history.

In 1996, several men called to see if they could be of some use to HAWC. The Director, Margo Casey, called us together to talk. The group expanded to include police officers, DA staff, teachers, a therapist, and some high school students. Three women from HAWC met twice a month with us for about a year and a half. In the beginning, HAWC took responsibility for keeping the meetings scheduled. We men shared our personal stories about why we wanted to help.

After several months the men started taking responsibility for the meetings. We created Men for HAWC, with a mission of supporting the work of HAWC and finding ways to end men’s silence about violence against women. Men for HAWC received a great deal of positive press locally, in the Boston Globe, and on television.

We made a flier, based on one made by The White Ribbon Campaign (see Links), which outlined a dozen things men can do to help stop men’s violence against women. We produced it in English and Spanish and distributed it. We also produced a half-hour community access television program with an African-American woman interviewing five men discussing these issues. We had Men for HAWC baseball caps made. Soon after, one of us was at Burger King and a young African-American girl was behind the counter. She looked up at his hat and then at his face and then at his hat again and a tear rolled down her cheek as she said “I didn’t know there were any men for HAWC.”

Several of the founders of Men for HAWC were professionals spending their workweeks focused on domestic violence and the last thing they wanted were evening meetings on these issues. We became a smaller steering committee, calling on these other men when needed. Three women staff members from HAWC continue to work with us frequently, including Candace Waldron, the current Executive Director.

In Men for HAWC’s third year we decided to focus on activities within local communities. Two more television shows were produced in Lynn, one in English and one in Spanish, both featuring Latino men with Sonia Peña, the director of HAWC’s Lynn office.
We ordered bumperstickers against domestic violence. Then two high schools, including St. John’s Prep, (a large Catholic boys’ school) and Danvers High School, held a bumpersticker rally. One committed teacher, a guidance counselor, and a bunch of students organized it without much effort or expense. The rally was run by students on the Saturday before Mother’s Day, 2000. A little over 100 cars and trucks came to get bumper stickers. The Danvers Police donated 100 long-stem white carnations, one to be given to each man so he could pass it on to a woman. The local and regional press covered the event, and the community was left with all those bumper stickers in circulation. It was decided to do it again every two years and this year 175 vehicles participated.
A few members of Men for HAWC who live in Gloucester decided to organize locally. One important point should be noted here: With HAWC’s consent we decided not to begin the Gloucester effort as Men for HAWC, but as Gloucester Men Against Domestic Abuse (GMADA). This is a crucial distinction. By focusing on our opposition to men’s violence against women, rather than on our support for HAWC, we were able to gain support from a much broader cross-section of the male community. In 1999, we asked men to walk in the city’s annual Fourth of July “Horribles” Parade. The best way to trace the history of Gloucester Men Against Domestic Abuse (GMADA) is to look at Parade, Playhouse, Billboard. You may also read articles in Press Coverage.

A further development for our city has been the creation, in 2000, of a broad-based Coalition for the Prevention of Domestic Abuse and the declaration of Gloucester as a Domestic Violence-Free Zone. This fulfills a long-term vision of Nicole Richon Schoel, the Director of the Gloucester HAWC office as well as HAWC’s Director of Community Outreach. For more details see Domestic Violence-Free Zone.

L. to R. Nicole Richon Schoel, Craig Norberg-Bohm, Eddie Harris, and Kyle Butler Harris.