Announcing

Colour of Violence II:

Race, Gender, and Policing Responses
to Gender-Based Violence in BC

Anonymous Survey

If you are willing to discuss your experiences related to policing and gender-based violence in BC, take our online survey and enter the draw for a $100 gift card

Take the survey here >

Racialized Survivors

If you are a racialized survivor who is interested in a one-on-one interview, fill out this one-on-one interview form to be eligible for $200 compensation.

Please fill out this form >

Frontline Workers

We will be hosting focus groups with frontline workers in the anti-violence sector.  If you participate in one of our 3-hour focus groups, you will receive $150 compensation.

Please fill out this form >

Battered Women’s Support Services (BWSS) is excited to announce the launch of our next participatory research project, Colour of Violence II: Race, Gender, and Policing Responses to Gender-Based Violence in BC.

This next phase of our multi-year Colour of Violence project will provide crucial insights into the intersection of race and gender in police interactions with Black, Indigenous, newcomer immigrant/refugee, racialized survivors of gender-based violence in BC.

This research will gather and analyze community-based accounts of police responses to Indigenous, Black, and newcomer immigrant/refugee, and racialized survivors across BC who have reported, or choose not to report, gender-based violence to the police.

Specifically, our research will assess police responses to survivors of gender-based violence, such as: police action or police inaction; police attitudes towards racialized survivors reporting gender-based violence; experiences with, and perceived helpfulness of, police; the criminalization and/or arrest of survivors reporting gender-based violence; and police adherence to policies created to protect survivors, such as BC’s Violence Against Women in Relationships (VAWIR) policy.

The geographic scope of this project includes Vancouver Island, Northern BC, the Interior of BC, and the Lower-Mainland.

This important project will amplify the voices of racialized survivors themselves, and of those anti-violence workers and experts that support them.

What is BWSS’s Colour of Violence work?

Colour of Violence II: Race, Gender, and Policing Responses to Gender-Based Violence in BC emerges out of BWSS’s ongoing, multi-year Colour of Violence project, examining the intersections of race and gender for Black, Indigenous, migrant/refugee, racialized women and gender diverse people experiencing gender-based violence in British Columbia.

Our first project, Colour of Violence: Race, Gender & Anti-Violence Services, included surveys with 105 survivors, focus groups with anti-violence workers of colour, and a series of public events.

By placing racialized survivors at the center of our anti-violence work, we found that Indigenous, Black, newcomer immigrant/refugee, and racialized survivors in B.C face numerous barriers to accessing safety and support, such as lack of access to culturally safe services; mistrust of the legal system and other state systems; and being minimized or disbelieved.

Racialized survivors reported that police were the least helpful form of support.

 

Colour of Violence II: Race, Gender, and Policing Responses to Gender-Based Violence in BC

Colour of Violence II: Race, Gender, and Policing Responses to Gender-Based Violence in BC builds on this work to provide further insights into the intersection of race and gender in police interactions with racialized survivors of gender-based violence in BC.

As a frontline anti-violence organization, we know that the police are a primary interface for many survivors of gender-based violence. This makes it necessary for us to collect, analyze, and share community-based knowledge by and from survivors.

We will be posting more information over the summer about how you, as a survivor or anti-violence worker, can participate in this project through online surveys, compensated interviews, and focus groups.

If you or others you know are interested in this work and have experiences to share for this important new project, we encourage you to sign up to receive updates here:

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