What Does Gender Equality Have to Do With Sexualized Violence?
Gender Equality Week | September 20–26, 2026
What does gender equality have to do with sexualized violence?
More than we might think.
When we talk about gender equality, we often talk about equal opportunities, equal pay, representation in leadership, or access to education and employment. These are important parts of creating a more equitable society.
But equality is also about something more fundamental: having the freedom, safety and autonomy to live our lives without experiencing violence because of our gender, or being subjected to sexualized violence, harassment, coercion or discrimination.
That is where gender equality connects directly to the work of the Victoria Sexual Assault Centre (VSAC).
Equality means having autonomy over your own body
At its heart, gender equality is about having the same rights, choices and opportunities to participate fully in our lives and communities.
That includes the right to make decisions about our own bodies.
It means being able to say yes or no to sexual activity. It means having our boundaries respected. It means being able to go to work, school, social spaces and public places without being subjected to unwanted sexual behaviour. And it means being able to seek support when something happens to us without being blamed, dismissed or made to feel responsible for someone else's actions.
These may sound like basic expectations. They should be.
Yet sexualized violence continues to affect people across Canada at significant rates, and the impact is not experienced equally.
Sexualized violence is a gender equality issue
The latest data from Statistics Canada paints a stark picture.
According to the 2025 Survey of Safety in Public and Private Spaces, 37% of women in Canada reported experiencing sexual assault at least once since age 15, compared with 11% of men. Among women aged 25 to 34, nearly half, 49%, reported experiencing sexual assault in their lifetime.
Sexualized violence also extends beyond sexual assault.
In 2025, 22% of women reported experiencing at least one form of unwanted sexual behaviour in a public place during the previous year, compared with 8% of men. Women were also more likely than men to experience unwanted sexual behaviour in the workplace.
These numbers do not tell the whole story. They cannot capture every experience, and many incidents of sexualized violence are never reported.
But they do make one thing clear: sexualized violence is not an isolated issue. It is a widespread social issue that is deeply connected to gender, power and inequality.
Not everyone experiences violence in the same way
Gender is only one part of a person's experience.
The risk of experiencing violence, and the ability to access support, can also be shaped by racism, colonialism, disability, poverty, sexual orientation, gender identity, age and other forms of systemic inequality.
For some people, these barriers overlap. This is why a meaningful conversation about gender equality cannot treat everyone as though they experience the world in the same way.
At VSAC, our feminist and anti-oppressive approach recognizes the systemic barriers that can affect people's safety, access to services and ability to heal. Our work is grounded in social justice, equity, accessibility and respect for each person's dignity.
We also know that creating safer communities means ensuring that survivors are able to access support in ways that recognize and respect their identities and experiences. Many of VSAC's services are open to Trans, Two-Spirit and gender-diverse survivors of sexualized violence.
What does equality look like in everyday life?
Gender equality can sometimes feel like a big, abstract idea.
But it shows up in ordinary moments.
It looks like a young person knowing that they have a right to say no.
It looks like a friend responding with care rather than blame when someone discloses an experience of sexual assault.
It looks like a workplace taking sexual harassment seriously.
It looks like adults challenging jokes or comments that normalize sexual violence rather than laughing them off.
It looks like parents and caregivers having conversations with children about boundaries, bodily autonomy and respect.
It looks like believing survivors.
And it looks like creating systems where people do not have to overcome additional barriers simply to access help.
These everyday actions matter because culture does not change all at once. It changes through the expectations we set, the behaviours we challenge and the ways we respond to one another.
Prevention is part of gender equality
At VSAC, ending sexualized violence means more than supporting survivors after violence has occurred.
It also means working toward prevention.
Our mission is to end sexualized violence through healing, education and prevention. That means supporting survivors while also creating opportunities for learning, conversation and community action.
Prevention asks us to look beyond individual incidents and consider the environments and attitudes that allow sexualized violence to continue.
How do we teach children and young people about consent and healthy relationships?
How do we challenge gender stereotypes that limit people's choices?
How do we create workplaces, schools and community spaces where harassment is not tolerated?
How do we make sure that people who experience violence are met with support rather than shame?
These are gender equality questions, too.
Gender Equality Week is a chance to keep asking what equality looks like
From September 20 to 26, people across Canada will recognize Gender Equality Week, an opportunity to celebrate progress toward gender equality while acknowledging the gaps that remain.
For VSAC, it is also an opportunity to connect a national conversation to the work happening in our own communities.
Because gender equality is not only about who has access to opportunities.
It is also about who feels safe. Who has autonomy. Whose boundaries are respected. Whose experiences are believed. And who can access support when those rights are violated.
A community cannot be truly equal while sexualized violence continues to limit people's safety, freedom and ability to participate fully in their lives.
Creating change takes all of us: survivors and supporters, parents and caregivers, educators and employers, community organizations and policymakers.
Support is available
If you have experienced sexualized violence, recently or in the past, you are not alone, and it was not your fault.
The Victoria Sexual Assault Centre provides support, counselling, victim services and crisis response for survivors of sexualized violence. Our Service Access Line is 250-383-3232.
You do not need to have everything figured out before reaching out. Our support workers can talk with you about your options and help connect you with the services that are right for you.
Gender equality means having the freedom to live, choose, participate and belong without violence. Working toward that kind of equality is part of ending sexualized violence, and it is work we can all be part of.
