Responding to Gender-Based Violence

What is gender-based violence?

Gender-based violence is violence directed at a person based on their gender or perceived gender, gender identity, or gender expression. GBV also encompasses the varying ways power and control are used to harm another person because of their gender. This “can take many forms including cyber, physical, sexual, societal, psychological, emotional, and economic.”

Responding to gender-based violence

Children who witness gender-based violence (GBV) may experience a range of physical, emotional, psychological, and social effects that impact their overall well-being and capacity to learn. Members can make a difference in the lives of these children by providing support and advocating for learning communities that are free from violence.

Statistics on gender-based violence

Statistics consistently show that intersecting experiences of oppression increase the risk of gender-based violence and intimate partner violence (IPV):

Women are more likely than men to experience intimate partner violence (IPV). Self-reported data collected in 2018 shows that 44 per cent of women reported experiencing some form of IPV in their lifetime (since the age of 15).
Although gender-related homicide rates for women and girls have declined since 2001, there was a 14 per cent increase between 2020 and 2021 (from 0.48 to 0.54 victims per 100,000 women and girls), marking the highest rate recorded since 2017.
In 2018, self-reported data showed that Indigenous women were more likely to experience some form of IPV in their lifetime (since the age of 15) compared with non-Indigenous women; these rates are 61 per cent for Indigenous women compared to 44 per cent for non-Indigenous women.
More than half of women with disabilities have experienced some form of IPV in their lifetime.
42 per cent of transgender and gender-diverse people experienced online harassment, compared to 16 per cent of cisgender people.
Six out of 10 Canadians who identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or a sexual orientation that is not heterosexual have been physically or sexually assaulted, compared to four out of 10 heterosexual Canadians.
One-quarter of visible minority women between the ages of 15 and 24 experienced IPV. This aggregated data does not provide information about rates of IPV within specific racialized communities.

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