I learned a lot as I attended the webinar about the 18-day campaign to end VAW.

The slides
from the PowerPoint they presented are in detail and can be understood easily. The discussion
and explanation of the topics by the guest speaker, Dr. Nelia Cresino, are very well set and
made us learn deeply about the issues regarding violence against women, national laws on
VAW, and the provisions of selected VAW laws.

As the webinar started, the speaker introduced first the legal mandates, which declared certain
things concerning the violence against women and children and some other things about the
campaign. The Proclamation 1172 series of 2006 states November 25 to December 12 as the
18-day campaign to end violence against women. Then, RA 10398 series of 2013, which
declares November 25 of every year as National Conscious Day for Elimination of Violence
Against Women and Children. The other one is the PCW Memorandum Circular 2017-04, which
states the theme "VAW free community starts with me" from 2016 to 2021. To be unaware of
those things will surely make us clueless about the core concept of the campaign. Therefore,
the speaker made some point in introducing some information first about the campaign. As the
speaker continued, she explained more in details the violence against women. I've learned that
it is not limited to physical abuse but also emotional, verbal, economic, and even sexual abuse.
Thus, violence is not happening in one scenario or place only. It can be committed in-home, in
the community, or as perpetrated or condoned by the state too. As seen in the continuation of
the discussion, violence against women still exists as we continue to do victim-blaming, hiding
the perpetrator, invoking the natural order of things, and limiting the scope of violence against
women. The speaker further discussed things such as the factors and impacts of the violence
against women on society and women themselves. It's good that the speaker also clarified the
difference of laws about VAW and even the given punishment to the offenders.

All in all, the webinar went well, and they delivered the ideas and theme of the campaign
concisely. Being one of the students who should be fully aware of things, I was enlightened, and
I gained knowledge about something useful for me as a woman too. Learning these things
made me realize that violence against women and children still exist even there are laws and
penalty given to the offenders. We might be aware of these things, but awareness isn't enough
to empower the campaign. We need to do some actions and instill the things we've learned
about the violence against women. Because if we just let the violence continue to happen, there
will never be a change about it unless the right actions acted upon it.