Mensafe.com: Campaign To Pledge Non-Violence

Mensafe.com is a new website created for men to have the opportunity to pledge non-violence and reject family and community violence – but it’s founder, Melbourne man David Field, has discovered it already has a much broader appeal.

Field says the site is aimed at people who are interested in creating safer families and communities who can visit the site and view the pledges made by others and while men are his primary target, many women and community groups are also making their own pledges to end violence in all its forms.

Field says workplaces can submit a pledge and schools can create their own pledge and have everyone in the school sign their name to it, pledging to work against bullying for example.

Sporting teams and other organisations and clubs can submit a pledge.

Mensafe.com has a goal of 100,000 pledges by the end of 2005.

David Field has spent the last decade in men’s behavioural change projects, and anger management courses. Now he’s a supervising trainer and telephone counsellor as well as running a Community Health Service in the Victorian coastal town of Rosebud.

Field says the aim of mensafe.com is to create a movement for non violence, to increase awareness and let people know they can have their say and maybe create an action in their own family and community.

It’s also for men to have their say about their commitment to peace in their own lives. To increase the awareness of the effects of family violence and community violence. So children, women and men can live in peaceful, active communities.

Field says violence is a community problem, a community that men are a part of. Therefore men have a responsibility to unite powerfully by making a stand for non-violence to influence and change community attitudes to violence.

Family and community violence can include: violence against women, child abuse, violence against men, violent crime, road rage, workplace violence and bullying, school violence and bullying, racism, sexism, and physical, verbal, emotional, social, spiritual and other forms of controlling and abusive behaviours are all included in mensafe.com definition of violence.

Field’s own mensafe.com pledge is:
I declare that I stand for the rejection of family violence and community violence in all its forms (verbal, emotional and physical).

Visitors to the website can decide to agree with this pledge or make their own.

The mensafe.com Objectives are to:
– Provide leadership which demonstrates the way men are taking responsibility for and rejecting family and community violence.
– Bring the power of a man¡¦s word and his integrity back into focus. Making a pledge is a powerful action.
– Be a part of a movement where men actively speak out for peace and reject violence in families and communities.
– Create more community awareness of ways to bring about peace and reduce family and community violence.
– Provide links to sources of help such as books, telephone counselling, groups, on line counselling service for men who want to change their own violent behaviour.
– Provide a forum for updated information, articles and comments which have the aim of rejecting and reducing violence.
– Become part of the ‘week without violence campaign’ in order to publicise the prevention of family and community violence and the contribution of mensafe.com ie number pledges, hall of fame and examples of pledges made.

Mensafe.com has been funded privately so far and Field says he will approach Governments and donors for future support through the auspices of an organisation called “No To Violence”.

Check out the website at www.mensafe.com.