Start-up Ovira uses mobile billboards to highlight violence against women
Content warning: this article discusses violence against women. If you or someone you know is impacted by violence, call 1800 RESPECT on 1800 737 732 or visit www.1800RESPECT.org.au. In an emergency, call 000.
Period pain relief start-up Ovira has launched its first out-of-home campaign, to raise awareness of a recent case involving the alleged assault of a woman. The case has garnered significant media attention due to the charged not being convicted despite pleading guilty to the assault.”
On the appropriateness of a brand getting involved in activism, Ovira founder Alice Williams told Mumbrella: “If not us, then who?”
One of the billboards outside of Knox Grammar School
The mobile billboards were positioned outside of Knox Grammar, where the charged previously went to school and the Downing Centre and District Court in Sydney on Sunday 27 September.
The billboards stated: “You will not silence our pain.”
In a statement to Mumbrella, Williams said: “As a brand, we are in a privileged position to have a platform and a community that can drive advocacy, so we are using it to amplify the voices of those who don’t have the means to speak out and call for change.
“Our brand exists to end the unnecessary suffering of women, not just in our products but in building a community and a movement around tearing down the assumptions we have about pain being normal in a woman’s life.
“This case and other cases like it are so upsetting, specifically because it’s not surprising that the convictions were erased – it’s a product of the way we constantly dismiss women’s pain. We want to use our platform to empower women affected by this, reach out to victims suffering in silence so they understand they are heard and create conversation to enact change.”
In the past year, various campaigns have pushed for greater awareness of violence against women.
In March this year, UN Women Australia asked “When will she be right?” in a campaign via The Monkeys aimed at highlighting the inequality between the genders.
The campaign won a Bronze Lion in Social & Influencer Lions in the category of Social Content Marketing: Social Film at the most recent Cannes Lions.
Thinkerbell also released a campaign in April 2021 for community organisation Our Watch, an organisation that seeks to help prevent violence against women and children in Australia.
According to Our Watch, 1 in 3 Australian women have experienced physical violence since the age of 15 and almost one in 10 women (9.4%) have experienced violence by a stranger since the age of 15.
The billboards are owned by E-power media.
