'Draw the Line': women's rights activist, abuse survivor Julie Lalonde speaks in Sudbury

Up North8:22Take Back the Night march set for Sudbury

The Take Back the Night march is set to take place in Sudbury. Feminist activist Julie Lalonde, who is originally from Sudbury but now lives in Ottawa, is in the city for the event.

There is still plenty of work to be done to end violence against women, says Julie Lalonde — and you can help. 

Lalonde, an award-winning Ottawa-based women's rights activist originally from Sudbury, Ont., was the guest speaker at Sudbury's Take Back the Night rally on Thursday. The annual event and march, which is observed internationally, is an effort to "end sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, sexual abuse, and all other forms of sexual violence."

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Lalonde knows all too well the pain of that violence. 

"I survived intimate partner violence," she said. "I left a man who was abusive to me, and I was stalked for over 10 years. And I would do work publicly on violence against women, and then go home and suffer in silence because it wasn't safe for me to talk about." 

"I want to be the person that I needed when I was suffering." 

Lalonde has since helped to create Draw the Line, an interactive provincial campaign that "challenges common myths about sexual violence and equips bystanders with information on how to intervene safely and effectively."

Lalonde said fewer than 10 per cent of sexual assaults are reported to authorities. She wants people who witness sexual violence happening in bars, at parties, on campus and anywhere else to stand up and do something about it — especially call out the perpetrators. 

"Socially, we're not even standing up and saying, 'This person can't party with us anymore.'"

Listen to the complete interview with Julie Lalonde here.