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Dear V-Day Activists,
I have been waiting for the right time to share something with you. I was recently diagnosed with uterine cancer. I was fortunate to have excellent doctors and a very successful operation. My prognosis is excellent.
This has been both a difficult and truly transformational time. Cancer has a way of stripping away that which is not important and leaving what is. What remains with me is all of you – your dedication, your commitment, your open hearts, your healing ways. I have learned so much in these two months about care and what it means to be cared for and to care for others. It requires time, attention, stillness and patience. That is the work of V-Day. So, if you truly want to help me now, continue to care, continue to stand up to end violence and work harder than you have ever worked before to make sure women and girls are safe and free, and that men and boys are embodied with their girl cell.
Know that I am taken care of and am focusing my time on resting for the next few months so I can be back with you all in the Fall, stronger than ever.
I love you all and I believe in you. You have been in my heart each and every day. You have been my deepest inspiration throughout this journey.
Love,
P.S. What follows is my first commentary piece since my diagnosis that I wanted to share with you, the piece is entitled Congo Cancer and will first appear in The Guardian newspaper in the UK on Saturday, June 12:
Congo Cancer by Eve Ensler
Some people might think that being diagnosed with uterine cancer, followed by an extensive surgery that lead to a month of debilitating infections, rounded off by months of chemotherapy, might get a girl down. But, in truth, this has not been my poison. This has not been what pulses through me late at night and keeps me pacing and awake. This has not been what throws me into moments of unbearable darkness and depression. ..
CONTINUE READING >
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jun/12/cancer-atrocities-congo-violence
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eve-ensler/congo-cancer-my-cancer-is_b_610830.html
By Eve Ensler
Photo: Paula Allen
Some people might think that being diagnosed with uterine cancer, followed by an extensive surgery that lead to a month of debilitating infections, rounded off by months of chemotherapy, might get a girl down. But, in truth, this has not been my poison. This has not been what pulses through me late at night and keeps me pacing and awake. This has not been what throws me into moments of unbearable darkness and depression. Cancer is scary, of course, and painful. It tends to interrupt one’s entire life, throw everything into question and pause, and push one up against that ultimate dimension and possibility of dying. One can rail at the Gods and Goddesses asking, Why? Why now? Why me? But, in the end, we know those questions ring absurd and empty. Cancer is an epidemic. It has been here forever. It isn’t personal. Its choice of the vulnerable host is often arbitrary. It’s life.
For months, doctors and nurses have cut me, stitched me, jabbed me, drained me, cat-scanned me, x-rayed me, IV-ed me, flushed me, hydrated me, trying to identify the source of my anxiety and alleviate my pain. While they have been able to remove the cancer from my body, treat an abscess here, a fever there, they have not been able to even come close to the core of my malady.
Three years ago, the Democratic Republic of Congo seized my being. V-Day was invited to visit and see firsthand the experience of women survivors of sexual violence there. After three weeks at Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, where there were over 200 women patients, many of whom shared their stories of being gang raped and tortured with me, I was shattered. They told me about the resulting loss of their reproductive organs and the fistulae they got – the hole between their vagina and anus or vagina and bladder which no longer allowed them to hold their urine or feces. I heard about 9-month-old babies, 8-year-old girls, 80-year-old women who had been humiliated and publicly raped. In response, taking the lead from women on the ground, we created a massive campaign – STOP RAPING OUR GREATEST RESOURCE: POWER TO THE WOMEN AND THE GIRLS OF THE DRC – which has broken taboos, organized speak-outs and marches, educated and trained activists and religious leaders, and spurred performances of The Vagina Monologues across the country, culminating this month with a performance in the Congolese Parliament. V-Day activists have spread the campaign across the planet, raising money and consciousness. In several months, with the women of Congo, we will be opening the City of Joy, a community for survivors where women will be healed in order to turn their pain to power. Through the campaign, we have also sat and pleaded our case at 11 Downing Street, the White House, and the office of the UN Secretary General. We have shouted (loudly) at the Canadian Parliament, the US Senate, and the Security Council. Tears were shed; promises were made with great enthusiasm.
As I have laid in my hospital bed or attempted to rest at home over these months, it is the phone calls and the reports that come in daily from the Democratic Republic of Congo that make me ill. The stories of continued rapes, machete killings, grotesque mutilations, outright murdering of human rights activists – these images and events create nausea and weakness much worse than chemo or antibiotics or pain meds ever could. But even harder to deal with, in the weakened state that I have been in, is knowing that despite the ongoing horrific atrocities that have taken the lives of over 6 million people and left over 500 thousand women and girls raped and tortured, the international power elite appears to be doing nothing. They have essentially written off the DRC and its people, even after continued visits and promises.
The day is late. It is almost 13 years into this war. The Obama administration, as in most situations these days, refuses to take a real stand. Several months ago I visited the White House to meet with a high official to engage the First Lady in our efforts to end sexual violence in the Congo, believing that her solidarity would galvanize attention and action. I was told, essentially, that femicide was not her “brand”. Mrs. Obama, I was told, was focusing on childhood obesity. It surprised me that a woman with her capabilities lacked ambidextrous skills (or was it simply interest and will that was absent?). Then we have Secretary Clinton, who at least after much pressure visited the DRC almost a year ago, and made promises that actually meant a huge deal to the people. They were excited that the US government might finally prioritize building the political will in the Great Lakes region to end the war. But, of course, they are still waiting. And then there is the UN. The anemic and glacial pace and the death-like bureaucracy continue to allow and, in the case of MONUC and the Security Council, even help facilitate a deathly regional war.
Last week in Kinshasa, one of Congo’s great human rights activists, Floribert Chebeya Bahizire, was brutally murdered. In the same week, at Panzi Hospital in Bukavu the family of a staff member was executed. A 10 and 12-year-old boy and girl gunned down in their car on their way home. Murdering and raping of the women in the villages continues. The war rages on. Who is demanding the protection of the people of Congo? Who is protecting the activists who are speaking truth to power? At a memorial service last week in Bukavu, a pastor cried out, “They are killing our Mammas. Now they are killing our children. What have we done to deserve this? WHERE IS THE WORLD?”
The atrocities committed against the people of the Congo are not arbitrary like my cancer. They are systematic, strategic and intentional. At the root is a madly greedy world economy, desperate for more minerals robbed from the indigenous Congolese. Sourcing this insatiable hunger are multi-national corporations who benefit from these minerals and are willing to turn their backs on the players committing femicide and genocide, as long as their financial needs are met.
I am lucky. I have been blessed with a positive prognosis that has made me hyper-aware of what keeps a person alive. How does one survive cancer? Of course – good doctors, good insurance, good luck. But the real healing comes from not being forgotten. From attention, from care, from love, from being surrounded by a community of those who demand information on your behalf, who advocate and stand up for you when you are in a weakened state, who sleep by your side, who refuse to let you give up, who bring you meals, who see you not as a patient or victim but as a precious human being, who create metaphors where you can imagine your survival. This is my medicine, and nothing less will suffice for the people, for the women, for the children of the Congo.
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Call on President Obama and your Representatives to strengthen and apply fully Law 109-456 (The Democratic Republic of Congo Relief, Security, and Democracy Promotion Act) and to commit to ending the atrocities being committed against the people of the DRC.
PL 109-456 was signed into law in 2006 by President Bush, however has never been properly funded or implemented. The law has, for four years given the U.S. government the authority to take decisive, meaningful action regarding the Congo.
PL 109-456 currently:
- Gives the Sec. of state the power to withhold funds from the Kabila govt. if insufficient progress is being made towards achieving 15 U.S. policy goals.
- Gives the Sec. of State the power to withhold funds from countries acting to destabilize the Congo.
- Directs the Comptroller General to provide Congress with a detailed report regarding progress or lack of progress towards achieving the 15 U.S. policy goals. This report is to include a description of any impediments that prevent the accomplishment of the 15 policy goals, including any destabilizing activities undertaken in the DRC by government of neighboring countries.
- Authorizes the U.S. President to withhold U.S. funds to international agencies that support the DRC, if the Sec. of State determines the DRC is not making sufficient progress in achieving the 15 U.S. policy objectives.
READ all 15 U.S Policy Goals and PL 109-456 excerpts here >
TAKE ACTION TODAY by contacting your elected officials and letting them know that the U.S.’s role in improperly addressing the holocaust in the Congo is a travesty of justice and will not be tolerated.
President Barack Obama
The White House,
District of Columbia 20500
Phone: (202) 456-1414
Fax: (202) 456-2461
Secretary of State Clinton
U.S. Department of State
2201 C Street NW
Washington, DC 20520
Tel: 202-647-4000
Susan E. Rice
U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations
United States Mission to the United Nations
140 East 45th Street
New York, N.Y. 10017
Tel: 212-415-4062
Fax: 212-415-4053
Find contact information for YOUR Congressperson here >
READ more about V-Day’s work in the Congo >
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V-Day was distraught to learn that Floribert Chebeya Bahizire, Congo’s leading human rights activist was found dead on Wednesday, June 2, following repeated threats on his life. He was the Executive Director of one of Congo’s largest human rights organization Voix des Sans Voix (VSV). His body was found in a car after he was due to meet with a top police official. Chebeya had faced harassment from police and government officials for his work against corruption and state-backed killings. The UN rapporteur for extrajudicial executions, Philip Alston, says Chebeya’s death “strongly suggests official responsibility” from the DRC government.
“We have to wonder where is the world community and where are the promises that were promised by the United States government, by Secretary Clinton, by the Obama administration. And I think it’s really important that all of us wake up to the fact that hundreds, thousands of people are still being murdered and raped in the Congo, and their deaths are not being seen and being recognized anywhere, really.” – Eve Ensler
V-Day Congo Director Christine Schuler Deschryver also stated, “He was my friend, my hero in this country and the greatest activist the world has known. He called me two weeks ago to congratulate all V-Day’s work in Congo and to tell me he is going to come to Bukavu to report on human right violations regarding all the stories I told him. His death has left me so devastated and so revolted. Where is the world?”
V-Day asks you, our activists all around the world to stand with V-Day as we call on the Congolese government to immediately launch a thorough, impartial and independent investigation into the death of Floribert Chebeya Bahizire.
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V-Day Activist and V-Board Member Rosario Dawson To Speak at the Redford Center, San Francisco JUNE 9th
Rosario Dawson will be speaking at the Redford Center’s June 2010 Art of Activism program, on Wednesday, June 9th.
June 9, 2010, 7-9pm (doors open at 6:30pm)
Sundance Kabuki Cinemas
1881 Post St., San Francisco, 94115
General Admission $20 available online at http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/106991
The Redford Center is a non-profit organization working to inspire positive social and environmental change through the arts, education and civil discourse.
www.redfordcenter.org
WATCH video of Rosario at V-Day’s 4th Annual LA Luncheon >
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V-Day is pleased to announce that thanks to the dedication of our supporters, we’ve been named a Top-Rated nonprofit on GreatNonprofits, the leading provider of user reviews for nonprofit organizations.
The reviews were posted as part of the Women’s Empowerment Campaign 2010 conducted by GreatNonprofits, in partnership with Guidestar and a coalition of nonprofit organizations.
The list of Top-Rated organizations will be visible to funders and activists, and will continue to help V-Day grow in our efforts to end violence against women and girls worldwide.
You can read and write reviews for us anytime here >
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Join V-Day on FRIDAY, JUNE 4th for the GREAT MARCH – End CONGO GENOCIDE NYC Rally
Join V-Day in New York City this Friday as we help kick off the Great March from New York to Washington DC to End Congo Genocide!
Starting on June 4th at the UN and traveling to the White House on June 17th, 2010, the Great March will help to bring attention to the war in the DRC and call on President Obama to strengthen and apply fully Law 109-456 (The Democratic Republic of Congo Relief, Security, and Democracy Promotion Act) and to commit to ending the atrocities being committed against the people of the DRC.
RALLIES:
FRIDAY, JUNE 4TH; 11 A.M. @ UN: Dag H. Plaza (1st Ave. & 47th Street)
THURSDAY, JUNE 17TH, 2010; 11 A.M. @ White House: Lafayette Park
For additional information on how you can take part in the march from NYC to Washington D.C, please visit http://congocoalition.net/events.html
To learn more about V-Day’s work in the DRC, please visit http://drc.vday.org
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V-Day is pleased to announce that the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has rescinded the controversial new policy advocating for “federal and state laws [to] enable pediatricians to reach out to families by offering a ‘ritual nick'”, which would include making an incision to a girl’s clitoris.
Following public outcry from Equality Now and V-Day, along with individual activists, the AAP released this statement:
“We retracted the policy because it is important that the world health community understands the AAP is totally opposed to all forms of female genital cutting, both here in the U.S. and anywhere else in the world.”
While this is a great victory and raises awareness for the fight to end Female Genital Mutilation, it is important that we continue our efforts to denounce this harmful practice and support the survivors and local activists working to end it in their communities.
READ V-Day’s Call on the AAP to Retract Their Policy Statement >
DONATE to V-Day’s Safe Houses in Kenya >
LEARN MORE about V-Day’s work in Kenya >
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Construction at the City of Joy: Construction work on the City of Joy continues in Bukavu, with each day bringing progress. Almost all of the ten houses, the administration building, dining room, and class rooms now have a roof and the construction crew have begun laying the floors, putting in the ceilings, as well as the installation for electricity and water. The security wall around City of Joy is almost finished. V-Day’s Congo Director/Director of City of Joy Christine Schuler Deschryver has begun working with local carpenters to start the building of furniture – all of the beds, chairs, etc. will be made by local craftsmen. All of this has taken place amidst an incredibly heavy rainy season and a series of delays with the construction crew and material shortages due to the regional conflict taking place in Eastern Congo. Our Congo team has been ‘moving mountains’ each and every day to actualize our dream, and the City of Joy will soon be a reality!
VIEW photos taken just this week >
TAKE A VIDEO TOUR of the City of Joy as it’s being built >
Opening Ceremony: We originally planned to hold the opening ceremony and host our first delegation on May 25th, but after close consultation with Christine and the women on the ground we have decided to reschedule the opening so our team can focus, in these next crucial months, on finishing of the building, hiring staff, developing the programs, and identifying the first group of women who will begin the program in fall 2010, pending any further delays with construction. We feel this will give the women at City of Joy time to get settled and offer our first delegation the complete City of Joy experience in winter 2011 – when they can bear witness to the transformation we envision at City of Joy and celebrate the strength of the women who we are turning pain to power. Updates to follow!
The Campaign – Stop Raping Our Greatest Resource Campaign: Power to the Women and Girls of the DRC: The campaign continues worldwide and throughout the Congo. Globally, between February and April, over 1,840 colleges and communities held over 5,500 V-Day events where the Congo was the Spotlight – activists performed a special monologue written by Eve about violence against women in the Congo and a background on the history of the Congo and V-Day’s campaign was printed in programs and in the local press and media. In addition, many of these locations held Congo teach-ins to educate their communities about the issue and hosted house parties showing our short film “Turning Pain to Power.”
VIEW “Turning Pain to Power” >
Among the many local campaign activities taking place in the DRC, Christine and her team hosted performances of The Vagina Monologues in Goma, the capitol of North Kivu, with much success, as the performances of the play opened up crucial dialogue around ending violence against women. The March 31st performance in Goma, was for the government and non-government officials with more than 250 people in attendance. The next day, the performance was for students, with over 350 in attendance, mostly men!
READ Christine’s first hand account of the events >
On May 4th and 5th, Christine and the V-Day Congo team brought their production of The Vagina Monologues to Bukavu, the capital of South Kivu, for government officials, including the Vice Governor, as well as students. Attendance was over 200 at each performance and inspired Christine to officially call Bukavu a “V-Town.”
READ Christine’s first hand account of the events in Bukavu >
READ local article about the event >
Involving the Faith-Based Community in Congo: In mid-April, Christine hosted a day with local religious leaders and traditional chiefs and spoke with them about the City of Joy, as well the need and philosophy behind the project. Since then, Christine has been invited to speak at many local churches and the dialogue with the faith-based community in the Congo continues.
United Nations Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict Visits City of Joy Site: Also in April, the newly appointed United Nations Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict Margot Wallstrom visited the City of Joy site and was given a tour by Christine. She expressed her support for the program and the larger Stop Raping Our Greatest Resource campaign. Wallstrom’s visit followed a meeting in New York where she met with Eve Ensler, who has subsequently joined her advisory committee.
Mayo Clinic Doctors to Panzi Hospital: A team of doctors from the renowned Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN will travel to Bukavu later this year to work with Dr. Denis Mukwege at the Panzi Hospital and his team. Five doctors and two nurses from Mayo will offer their services for one week. They have already shipped a donation of much needed medical equipment to the hospital – see the picture of Dr. Mukwege receiving the shipment.
Amidst these great developments and our ongoing optimism, the Democratic Republic of Congo is still at war and women’s bodies continue to be caught in the crossfire. Rape is rampant and brutal; fighting between rebels groups, the army and civilians is recurrent and deadly. As the country’s vast amounts of natural resources are plundered and the infrastructure of the country is destabilized, the state of the national economy remains dire.
It is therefore vital to keep our work going, to continue to raise awareness and funds, and to show our support for the women and girls of the DRC. While we celebrate our victories, we recognize that our work is not finished. We need your continued support and activism to help women and men on the ground bring and peace to the region.
Together we can change the story of women in the DRC!
For more information on V-Day’s support of the women in Congo, visit vday.org/drc and please be sure to visit our online gift registry to provide your support to the City of Joy!
With V-Love,
The V-Day Team
DONATE to V-Day’s Stop Raping Our Greatest Resource: Power to the Women and Girls of the DRC Campaign >
HELP BUILD the City of Joy through our Gift Registry >
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Following a sold-out show and incredible audience reaction from the first two performances of The Vagina Monologues in Goma, DRC, V-Day Congo Director Christine Schuler Deschryver brough the play to , Bukavu, the captial of South Kivu and future home of the City of Joy. The events continued to bring hundreds of women and men together and raised significant awareness for V-Day’s Congo Campaign, Stop Raping Our Greatest Resource: Power to the Women and Girls of the DRC. Following is Christine’s first hand account:
On May 4th, we had our premiere performance of The Vagina Monologues in Bukavu, capital of South Kivu, DRC. The audience of over 200 people included the Vice Governor, Ministers, Deputies, the Division Chief of Gender and Family Section, Chief of Army, police officers, international NGOs, U.N. agencies, local and national NGO’s, activists and a lot of press. Our actresses were once again amazing.
At the beginning of the show, the Vice Governor made an amazing speech, asking people to not only enjoy the performance as a piece of theater, but to listen to the important messages within the play. For the first time in the DRC, our actress Justine read the new Congo Spotlight Monologue, A Teenage Girl’s Guide To Surviving Sex Slavery. The emotions this piece created within the audience were powerful, the experiences portrayed in the monologue so familiar that it elicited a heavy silence and lots of tears.
Following the performance we held a cocktail party, at which numerous discussions were held about touring the production across the country.
What really made me cry was when we left the building, some poor women selling bananas and oranges came and asked me “how can we become V-DAY?” In the middle of the night these women started explaining the violence they face everyday, and thanked us for helping the women and girls of the DRC feel comfortable about speaking about their vaginas.
On May 5th, we did another performance for students at the Catholic cathedral (Concordia). Though we wrote to ask to use their room and they responded positively, I was still very worried they didn’t properly read the title of the piece and that they would not allow us to proceed with the production. I was surprised, therefore, to learn that the church had invited all of the religious leaders and traditional chiefs, so that, in the words of the Cathedral’s priest, we could “talk about this organ [vagina] and name it to denounce all the atrocities we are facing in our country.” When I heard this, I looked at my colleague and I knew something was going on in DRC. The event was a huge success, with between 400 and 500 students attending and constructive and enlightening discussions taking place following the performance.
Now, following these performances and the ongoing work at the City of Joy, every day I receive lots of emails, messages and letters. Bukavu has became a V-Town, so many women who attended to the performance told me that we are all the same, united!
LEARN MORE about V-Day’s work in the DRC >
READ local article about the event >
DONATE to V-Day’s Congo Campaign >
HELP BUILD The City of Joy >
READ Christine’s Recap from The Vagina Monologues in Goma, DRC >