Gil Hanke to speak at national conference on ending violence against women

Sept. 9 and 10 in Nashville.

NASHVILLE, Tenn.--YWCA Nashville & Middle Tennessee will host the first ever national conference on violence against women and healthy masculinity Sept. 9 and 10 in Nashville. Keynote and featured speakers include Terry Crews, Time Magazine’s 2017 Person of the Year and Silence Breaker; Eddie George, former NFL star; and Alejandra Castillo, chief executive officer of YWCA USA.

Gil Hanke, chief executive officer of the General Commission on United Methodist Men, will co-lead a workshop with Rashed Fakhruddin, director of community programs of the Islamic Center of Nashville.

SHIFT: An AMEND Together Conference is a 2-day event dedicated to ending violence against women and girls by engaging men and boys to change the culture that supports violence. The conference is supported by Vanderbilt University’s Sports and Society and YWCA USA.

Hanke and Rick Vance, a commission staff member, worked with YWCA leaders to develop “Amending through Faith,” an eight-week study designed to combat a male culture that treats women as sexual objects, an orientation that encourages domestic abuse.

According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, nearly 20 people per minute are physically abused by an intimate partner in the United States. One in four women and one in nine men will experience severe intimate partner physical violence, intimate partner contact sexual violence, and/or intimate partner stalking.

“When discussing domestic and sexual violence, the emphasis is typically put on ways that women can escape those situations. AMEND Together shifts the culture by educating boys and men on behavioral changes that can prevent domestic violence incidents before they start,” said Shan Foster, a former NBA and collegiate standout and vice president of YWCA External Affairs. He has led YWCA’s AMEND Together program since joining the organization in 2015.

Register to attend the event here.