Women Against Violence Against Women

Abbreviation	WAVAW
Formation	1977;48 years ago (1977) [1]
Focus	Anti-pornography; women's rights; feminism; civil rights
Membership	(20th century)

Women Against Violence Against Women is an American feminist, anti-pornography, activist organization, founded in 1977. ^{[1] [2]}

Background

In the 1970s and 1980s, there was a significant, feminist reaction in the United States to the increased popularity and cultural presence of pornography. In New York, the public debut of the film Snuff caused significant controversy in the media and a strong reaction by feminists, such as Andrea Dworkin, who picketed the movie house. From that action, the organization Women Against Pornography was created, whose founding members included prominent feminists, such as poet Adrienne Rich, author Grace Paley, sex educator Shere Hite, Andrea Dworkin, Gloria Steinem, and others. ^{[3] : 14} In San Francisco, the Women Against Violence in Pornography and Media organization was formed, in the 1970s, to protest against porn's "cultural dominance," initiating direct actions such as public slide shows, hostile tours of porn shops, and demonstrations in red-light districts. ^[2]

History

In 1977, a large group of women, led by radical feminist Marcia Womongold ^[4] and self-styled as "Women Against Violence Against Women," denounced and protested in public against the Atlantic Records' ad campaign for the Rolling Stones album Black and Blue , in Los Angeles, which depicted on a billboard a bound and bruised woman with the caption "I'm Black and Blue from the Rolling Stones — and I love it!". ^[5] The billboard was eventually removed after the group's protests, though the subsequent demands for other record companies to follow suit and "clean up" their LPs' covers were not successful. ^[6] The group coagulated into the eponymous organization ^[7] that went on to start a number of chapters in several cities throughout North America and the United Kingdom, with a particularly active chapter in Boston. ^[8]

In 1980, some five days after a Yorkshire Ripper murder, the Leeds, UK, chapter of Women Against Violence Against Women organized, along with Reclaim the Night, a two-day event, called the Women’s Liberation National Conference, its theme being "Sexual Violence Against Women." ^[9]

The Women Against Violence Against Women rape crisis center is still the largest one operating in British Columbia, Canada. ^{[10] : 172}

See also

• Opposition to pornography
• BDSM

References

1. "Women Against Violence Against Women". June L. Mazer Lesbian Archives . Retrieved August 20, 2025.
2. Echols, Alice (2019) [1989]. Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America, 1967-1975 (30th ed.). University Of Minnesota Press. ISBN   978-1517908706.
3. Bonanos, Christopher (June 2017). "This Isn't Fun Anymore". New York Magazine .
4. Womongold, Marcia (January 1, 1979). Pornography: A License to Kill. New England Free Press.
5. Bronstein, Carolyn (2011). Battling Pornography: The American Feminist Anti-Pornography Movement, 1976–1986. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN   978-1107400399.
6. "Really Socking It to Women". Time . London. February 7, 1977. Archived from the original on January 14, 2009. Retrieved August 20, 2025.
7. "Finding Aid for the Women Against Violence Against Women (WAVAW) collection, 1964-1994 LSC.1850". Online Archive of California . UCLA Library Special Collections. Retrieved August 20, 2025.
8. "Women Against Violence Against Women records". Northeastern University . Retrieved August 20, 2025.
9. Hamad, Hannah (January 19, 2021). "Women are Angry: Remembering the Feminist Protests at UK Cinemas of November and December 1980, Forty Years On". Women’s Film and Television History Network. Retrieved August 20, 2025.
10. True, Jacqui (2020). Violence against Women: What Everyone Needs to Know. Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0199378937.

External links

• "Women Against Violence Against Women". Tulane University . Mary Gehman’s Feminist Ephemera: Violence Against Women. Retrieved August 20, 2025.
• From the conservative backlash against the "destructive popularity of porn": Hart, David Bentley (Summer 2004). "The Pornography Culture". The New Atlantis . Retrieved August 20, 2025.
• From the perspective of one sex worker, published in Jacobin , when OnlyFans announced in 2021 it'd withdraw "adult content": Lee, Eve (August 24, 2021). "I Produce Adult Content on OnlyFans. Their Ban on Porn Will Hurt Me". Jacobin . Retrieved August 22, 2025.
• From a radical feminist response to the Jacobin article: Hanisch, Carol (August 30, 2021). "Supporting Porn Is Sexist, not Socialist!" . Retrieved August 22, 2025.
• From the progressive opposition to the "dehumanization of women through the normalization" of sexual violence in pornography: Emba, Christine (May 19, 2025). "The Delusion of Porn's Harmlessness" . The New York Times . Retrieved August 20, 2025.
• From a leftist perspective of equanimity: Dickerson, Debra J. (December 16, 2007). "Porn, Porn Everywhere". Mother Jones . Retrieved August 20, 2025. Don't get me wrong, porn's fine ... my problem with porn is the way it's saturated the culture and tells young girls that pole dancing and lap dances are feminist and empowering.

Further reading

• Williams, Linda, ed. (2004). Porn Studies. Duke University Press. ISBN   978-0822333128.
• DeCesare, Michael (2014). "Battling Pornography: The American Feminist Anti-Pornography Movement, 1976-1986". Social Movement Studies . 14 (5): 632–3. doi:10.1080/14742837.2014.971738.