Hands Across America

Hands Across America is a program designed by the National Institute of the Study of Violence to focus attention on the violence experienced by women in America. The essential elements of this program are: Women need to be more mindful of the types of violence visited upon women in this country and they need to support one another to stop the violence. It is not enough for a woman to say "I know women are being hurt by violence".

Women are being raped, mugged, abducted, sodomized, bludgeoned, and dismembered in record numbers. It is now time for women to look to themselves for the solution. One woman being raped, mugged, or murdered is one woman too many. The goal of Hands Across America is zero deaths of women other than natural causes. Women must act to rid this country of violence visited upon women.

For a woman to say I know the problem exists and she does nothing to stop the violence means she is contributing to the violence. We are now in a position of history where women must take sides. You must make a choice. Work towards a solution to stop the violence, continue accepting it by doing nothing, or join the ranks of women paying lip service to the problem. Buying bigger and stronger locks and taking karate classes is not enough. This behavior merely says women are still acting alone to solve a common problem.