International Women’s Day is celebrated globally every year on March 8th. To coincide with this event, we put the spotlight this month on a French charity that is fighting against gender-based violence.
In the late 1970s, a number of associations from the Women’s Movement came together to create the Féderation Nationale Solidarité Femmes (FNSF), the National Federation of Solidarity for Women. Its objective, to denounce violence against women, and in particular domestic violence. Today, it encompasses 81 organizations across the country that provide support and shelter to women survivors and their children.
Key Facts
Domestic violence is a real scourge on society that affects women all over the world.
According to a United Nations report released in November 2024, an estimated 736 million women have been harmed sexually or physically at the hands of a close partner or a stranger (30 percent of girls and women aged 15 and over).
In 2023, around 51,000 women and girls worldwide were killed by their partner or another close family member. Which means that 140 women and girls lose their lives every day at the hands of one of their family members.
In France, a woman dies every 3 days, killed by her spouse or ex-spouse (according to figures released by the Ministry of the Interior).
Their Mission
The National Federation of Solidarity for Women‘s mission is twofold:
We are committed to fighting to defend women’s rights to freedom, equality, integrity and offering our support to put an end to violence.
And we recognize violence against women as one of the manifestations of persistent inequalities between women and men.
The 3919 helpline
In 1992, the National Federation of Solidarity for Women launched the French helpline for women victims of family violence, which would become the 3919 number. It offers listening, information and advice to women victims of all types of violence, as well as to their friends and family members.
This service is anonymous, free from a landline or mobile in mainland France, and in the overseas departments. And when appropriate, it also offers guidance towards local support and care systems.
Cyber-violence
While some forms of domestic violence are now easy to identify, domestic cyberviolence is still mainly invisible and poorly understood. But it involved nearly 2500 calls to 3919 in 2023. And contrary to popular belief, this violence does not only affect young women. As more than 67% of callers were over 30 years old.
Our new digital tools have been diverted and used to exercise ever greater surveillance and control over us. The mobile phone becomes a tracker, a way to monitor all communications, to be reachable 24/7. Effectively making women at risk of domestic violence prisoners of this new technology.
For more information and to support this charity, please visit their website.
And if you, or someone you know, is a victim of domestic violence, don’t stay silent.
