The twelfth edition of the Conference organized by the Mararía sociocultural association has been held this weekend with a high rate of citizen participation, the highest in its history, according to its president, Nieves Rosa Hernández. Around 150 people have attended the activities open to the public and more than 50 people have signed up for the workshops organized by the association, in which the students have been initiated into the knowledge of nutrition, meditation, yoga, or self-defense.
Under the title "How do you see it?" Mararía has programmed three days of work around literature, painting, music and, of course, the problem of gender violence. Nieves Rosa Hernández assured that said participation, in addition to being very numerous, has proven to be of great quality in its interventions. "You could tell that people wanted to participate", she said.
More resources against gender violence
The conferences and the round table on gender violence also had a good level of participation. The debate lasted for three hours in which professionals from the Police, Justice and social services, who face the problem of victims on a daily basis, intervened.
Among others, José Luis Rivero, president of the Economic and Social Council, was present; Mativí Monteserín Rodríguez, socialist deputy for Asturias and speaker of the Comprehensive Law against Gender Violence; Esperanza Ramírez Eugenio, Head Judge of the Fuerteventura Court of Violence; Raimundo Villanueva, commissioner of the National Police of Arrecife, and Francisco Torres Stinga, dean of the Lanzarote Bar Association and president of the Insular Justice Board.
Different visions
Totally different visions, but all preceded and endorsed by an important professional career. "It allowed us to have a counterpoint between the people who resolve violence issues on a daily basis, such as the judge or the dean of the Bar Association, who have direct contact with victims of violence from a different perspective than we have from associations or the Police," said Nieves.
From that dialogue, with the legislative framework in the background, the speakers concluded "the need for institutions to truly believe in the State problem that gender violence is, so that they allocate resources so that the laws are feasible and can be put into practice; so that the courts can function, so that there is specialized personnel, such as psychologists, who are at the foot of the courts for what they need, etc.".
According to Nieves, the reality is that in these Conferences "we have taken a timid step that must be consolidated, because the daily reality is much more serious and gender violence will become one of the problems with the highest number of complaints in our society, until society normalizes", she concluded.
Literature, painting and music
The president of Mararía wanted to point out that domestic violence has not been the only issue addressed in these Conferences. "We have always opted for a cultural option, which is the one that will always dignify our society. And it is becoming clearer every day that women's problems must be society's problems, because women are 53 percent of the population, and we are also an essential part, like men, of a society that wants to advance and declares itself modern and progressive".
There have been three days of work around different artistic disciplines, which have had the participation of figures such as Dolores Campos Herrero. The Canarian writer and journalist was in charge of inaugurating this year's sessions and gave a conference on the relationship that contemporary writers could have with Cervantes, on the occasion of the IV Centenary of the publication of Don Quixote de la Mancha.
Exhibition
Nieves Rosa highlighted that the painting exhibition also had a great reception on the opening day. Indeed, on Friday an exhibition by the painter María Castro, an artist from Gran Canaria committed to the cause of women fighting for equal opportunities and who has already participated on other occasions in various events organized by Mararía, was inaugurated.
Music was also present, especially at the closing of the Conference, with the performance of Isabel, a young Canarian singer-songwriter, "a musical promise of our land that, from Mararía, we want to raise to the national level because the girl is worth it", said Nieves Rosa.