Asia-Pacific, Development & Aid, Headlines, Human Rights

RIGHTS-THAILAND: Young Men Say No to Violence Vs Women

BANGKOK, Aug 18 2009 (IPS) - Like all forms of abuse, ending violence against women is as much men’s fight as it is women’s. It’s a good thing some members of the opposite sex are taking on this challenge.

“We need to listen to the ‘unheard voice’ of women and be their ‘voice’ too,” declared Aekarak Sethi. “If we bring this out with the right attitude, then we will have taken the first steps to (raising) awareness about gender issues,” added the environmental science freshman at Mahidol University.

Like Aekarak, 22-year-old Tananchon Suttichuay’s eyes have been opened to the reality of gender-based violence.

“I have heard about it for years, but I never realised how important and serious it is,” said the International Relations senior from Chulalongkorn University.

Alongside these young men’s awakening to the reality of gender-based violence comes a growing understanding of the issues confronting Thai society in this regard, and how these affect, nay, violate women.

“We have places like Pattaya, known or ranked as one of the ‘sin cities’ in the world,” said Tananchon, where prostitution and human trafficking are rampant. He knows full well that women are among the prime targets of these social maladies.

Politics and a general sense of apathy among the public make it difficult to find solutions to the problem, he rues, notwithstanding the efforts of the authorities to address it.

“Thai people themselves consider this issue very common and not too serious compared to the problems of day-to-day living,” laments Tananchon, who hails from north-eastern Thailand.

Gender-based violence in Thai society “has long been an issue”, he said.

Statistics from the Thai Bureau of Health Systems Development Department, which has access to 300 hospital-based One Stop Crisis Centre (OSCC) units in the country, show that 19,068 women and children “suffered from violent abuse in 2007”. An average of 52 cases of “mental and physical violent abuse against women and children” is also reported daily from all of Thailand.

The United Nations reports that about 2.5 million people, most of them women and children, are being trafficked around the world at any given time for labour and sexual exploitation. Most of the abusers are reportedly either boyfriends or close male friends, as well as husbands and male relatives.

On Jun 5, 2008, Thailand enacted the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act 2008. This landmark legislation is expected to curb violence against women.

Getting males to understand the concept of gender-based violence need not be a formidable task. In the case of Aekarak and Tananchon, a two-day workshop on gender sensitivity did it for them.

The workshop was organised recently by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and facilitated by the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women-Asia Pacific (CATW-AP), a non-government organisation in the Philippines that promotes women’s human rights and stands against all forms of violence against women.

“Our idea was to work with young men and boys to educate them, make allies out of them in raising the level of awareness about gender-based violence in the country,” said Mika Mansukhani, UNIFEM project coordinator for preventing trafficking in women in Thailand.

“While I’ve always been interested in such campaigns, I never really had an opportunity to undergo a gender sensitivity workshop, and it has been quite an emotional experience for me,” Aekarak told IPS.

Hearing the experience of Filipino trafficking survivor Marevic Fontanilla helped strengthen the two men’s resolve to take a stand against gender-based violence.

Fontanilla is a survivor of child abuse and prostitution.

But more than the emotional impact of the workshop, what struck the young participants was the realization that emerged from being made to evaluate existing misconceptions about issues ranging from masculinity to gender roles, to name a few.

“What actually stood out was the similarity in terms of socialisation, how young men are steeped in their ideas and shaped by societal pressures to appear strong, act aggressively and the normalised idea that men can buy women and children,” said CATW-AP executive director Jean Enriquez.

Thai males are no exception, of course. According to Enriquez, their socialisation patterns are quite similar to those of other men in the region and, to a certain extent, globally.

“It has proved more challenging to change the widely accepted idea of buying women in Thailand, given also that the country is in the hub of sex trafficking in the region,” added Enriquez.

One common misconception that came up during the workshop was that women “enjoy pornography and (are) being used in the sex industry”, said Enriquez.

She added that many of the participants were “shocked” to hear the number of women who become victims of gender-based violence. They were equally alarmed by the number of local Thai men, especially young men, involved in buying women in prostitution, “especially for their first-time experience”, said Enriquez.

The Office of Women’s Affairs and Family Development reports that from 2005 to 2008, there have been 10,816 cases of domestic violence against women and children in Thailand. This translates to an average of 29 such cases each month. Perpetrators include male and female family members as well as strangers. Bangkok has the highest number of reported cases of violence in Thailand.

Physical abuse emerged as the most common form of abuse committed against women and children, followed by verbal abuse, rape and abandonment.

According to Aekarak, there was a big debate about the sheer magnitude of the problem during the workshop, with some of them saying that “women get into prostitution because they like it”.

With his newfound understanding of gender-based violence, Tananchon said he is committed to raising awareness of the issue. However, “it’s a long road ahead”, he cautioned. “It’s very hard and almost impossible to change one’s belief just like that,” he said.

Mansukhani concedes that it’s going to be a challenge for these young men to take action. “When they leave this ‘safe space’, they’ll be bombarded by the same problems. One-off trainings won’t work; we want to keep at it,” she said.

Notwithstanding the uphill battle facing men like Aekarak and Tananchon, they refuse to be daunted. Tananchon said he will try “as much as I possibly can”.

Aekarak believes it will be a gradual process. “It starts with your own self and will eventually spread to other people. Personally, I’ve made a commitment to listen, understand and respect women,” he said.

(*This feature was produced by IPS Asia-Pacific under a series on gender and development, with the support of UNIFEM East and South-east Asia Regional Office.)

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