I spoke with Casa Amiga\u2019s director, Lidia Cordero Cabrera, about the services that Casa Amiga provides the women of Mexico. She walked me through each of the three programs that the organization offers. The following conversation has been translated from Spanish to English.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lidia Cordero Cabrera, the director of Casa Amiga.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cordero Cabrera explained to me the step by step process of what happens when a woman walks through the doors and asks for help. \u201cCasa Amiga is a model that is already established,\u201d she explains. After she walks through the door, the first person she speaks with is the receptionist. \u201cThe reception area at Casa Amiga is a place with glass doors in which it allows the users to have a private area and she can tell the person at the reception without others listening.\u201d Cordero Cabrera notes that this gives the woman seeking help the confidence to ask for help in a more intimate and safe environment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n After she speaks with the receptionist, the intervention process begins. \u201cThe way that we are organized is that intervention is the first part that comes into working with women,\u201d Cordero Cabrera informs me. The intervention area is divided into multiple departments, with the first being social work. A social worker will conduct the first interview \u201cin a sensitive way and where they ask the problem.\u201d The social worker will also inform the victim of all the services that Casa Amiga offers so that the woman knows in which ways she will be supported. \u201cThen we offer her all the services we have to stop the violence she is experiencing,\u201d Cordero Cabrera states. From that interview, Casa Amiga is able to assess the different types of support that they can offer her, and she can choose how she would like to proceed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe area that she, let’s say, can choose, is the legal area,\u201d says Cordero Cabrera. Casa Amiga sits victims down with lawyers, and \u201cif she wants to exercise one of her rights to stop the violence,\u201d Casa Amiga\u2019s lawyers list her options. For example, the lawyers can assist her in filing a complaint or a lawsuit \u201cin which the lawyer accompanies her from the beginning until the end of the process of the lawsuit,\u201d she highlights. Casa Amiga ensures that the women of Mexico are supported through every step of the process; they are not alone. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Cordero Cabrera explains that a woman can also file for a restraining order, file for alimony for her children, or file a petition for a contentious divorce. A contentious divorce only requires that one of the parties wants a divorce. In these abusive cases, aggressors would never agree to a divorce, so a contentious divorce would be a victim\u2019s only divorce option. \u201cShe can decide which exercise of her legal rights she wants to do to stop that violence.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Esther Ch\u00e1vez Cano founded Casa Amiga as a place of refuge. After my grandmother\u2019s death, she left my father his childhood home, which he lent to his aunt, Esther, to use for Casa Amiga. Casa Amiga started in my father\u2019s childhood home, and Cordero Cabrera was proud to tell me that they still offer refuge. <\/p>\n\n\n\n During the interview with the social worker, \u201cThe social worker does a risk analysis,\u201d she explained. If she is at risk, she is given refuge for her safety, \u201cwhich is already the model of shelter that Esther founded to keep women safe.\u201d Casa Amiga has a safe house where they send women and children if Casa Amiga has reason to believe that their lives are at risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If a woman is in a situation where she needs refuge, Casa Amiga helps her begin the emotional process and assists her in \u201crecovering her kids if she left them at home, bringing her belongings, or if she needs documents, and then she enters the high security refuge.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another resource the organization offers is specialized psychological care. \u201cIf the violence is not putting her life at risk,\u201d Cordero Cabrera explains, \u201cbut she has already been a victim of rape or familial violence, she can enter the therapy process with specialists who are with her for the entire emotional process, supporting her emotionally.\u201d Psychological care is, of course, also offered to women who move into the safe house. <\/p>\n\n\n\n To further support women and children in need, Casa Amiga has a children\u2019s area. \u201cIt\u2019s a room where the children can be, accompanied by a teacher, while their mom\u2019s are being attended to, or are in therapy, or with their lawyer, or in social work,\u201d Cordero Cabrera explains. The children\u2019s area concludes Casa Amiga\u2019s intervention area. \u201cYou notice it is a multidisciplinary area. It has diverse areas for what she needs at that moment.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n If a woman is in need of medical care, Casa Amiga supports her through that process as well. Cordero Cabrera says that there is a women\u2019s health facility, named 046, that is often utilized by victims of rape. The building, she describes, is structured so that women are in a confidential and safe area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Social work, legal work, psychological work, and refuge, are all a part of Casa Amiga\u2019s intervention program. They have a second program called Prevenci\u00f3n (Prevention in English). Prevention is a community program, \u201cEsther mentioned it in her book,\u201d Cordero Cabrero tells me. \u201cThe program takes place outside and gives talks at schools, factories, community centers, and actually, right now, it focuses on themes of childhood sexual violence and sexual abuse of adolescents. We have a puppet theater and various things that we have with boys and girls, and that\u2019s what we do in Prevention.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is important to highlight that all of Casa Amiga\u2019s staff are women. This ensures that women who enter the organization feel safe and supported. Speaking with male lawyers, psychologists, and social workers can make the process of seeking help more daunting. It is crucial that women feel safe and supported and an all female staff helps achieve that. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat Esther didn\u2019t get to know about the programs, is the third program that we have,\u201d Cordero Cabrera adds. Although Ch\u00e1vez Cano did not live to see this program implemented, Cordero Cabrera tells me that \u201cshe already wanted to do it. She already had it as an idea\u201d The program is named Casa Equidad, Equity House. Unlike Casa Amiga\u2019s other programs that focus on supporting women, \u201cThis program attends to men that generate violence.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n To ensure the safety of Casa Amiga\u2019s clients, this program does not take place in Casa Amiga\u2019s main facility. Similar to how Casa Amiga has women with work women, this program has men working men. \u201cWe rent a house where there are psychologists, male, who are attending to men that have generated violence and adolescents, in psychological therapy of masculinity and exercises against violence so that they, the men, can also change.\u201d This program is crucial to fighting violence against women. There is so much focus on what to do after the fact, but not enough focus on preventing violent incidents entirely. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I asked Cordero Cabrera if all the services at Casa Amiga are free, including lawyers, to which she responded, \u201cThat\u2019s right. What we do to offer this attention is to look for funding, projects, international funding, funding from foundations, from diverse institutions to provide all of these services.\u201d The only program that they require donations for is the prevention one. Cordero Cabrera specifically mentioned the factory visits. \u201cWe ask the factories for a donation. Above all, the donations are specific, we gather cleaning items, stationary for the office, toilet paper, chlorine, all of that. We seek that the factories have a responsibility to give specific donations for the operation of the organization.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n My parents remember hearing from my great-aunt how dangerous it was for her to work at Casa Amiga. My mother recalls countless stories of men banging on the doors demanding for their girlfriend, wife, or daughter to be returned to them. Cordero Cabrera says that this danger still exists. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe already know that it is part of the dynamics of violence, that the aggressors\u2014usually husbands or partners\u2014come looking for them here,\u201d she reflects. \u201cThey bang [on the doors], they have broken the glass on the doors, they have wanted to throw the cars in front, and now we look for more security measures. We have security doors, we have cameras, we have panic buttons, we have a direct line to the police, the panic button activates a direct call to the police, alarms, so we have some mechanisms that do not allow them to enter.\u201d Casa Amiga does everything it can to protect its staff and the women that they help. The threat of the abusers has never prohibited them from helping the women of Ju\u00e1rez.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe always say in our analysis that those who are at most at risk are the women, the partners of the men. What the [men] come to look for is them, they want to get her out of here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A staff member at the safe house, however, had a horrific experience with one of the abusers. \u201cOne of the psychologists was kidnapped,\u201d Cordero Corbera recounts, \u201cThey took her beaten up, and they left her for dead. They threw her away. Fortunately, she lived. Esther was still alive when this occurred.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The situation certainly opened the eyes of Casa Amiga workers. \u201cIt was one of the strongest situations that made us reinforce safety for the personnel, for those that work here,\u201d Cordero Cabrera says. They have implemented safety codes, the staff leaves together, and their cars are parked inside the property. \u201cAll of those are safety mechanisms that have been enforced over the years to avoid this.\u201d Unfortunately, Cordero Cabrera says that violence against staff is something that they know to emotionally and mentally prepare for. Every Casa Amiga employee exhibits amazing courage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Casa Amiga sees seven new women every day. This number does not include returning women. Every day, seven new women walk through the doors seeking help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Esther Ch\u00e1vez Cano outside Casa Amiga<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Mexican government and authorities are notorious for neglecting the large-scale issue of femicide. The Mexican President, Andr\u00e9s Manuel L\u00f3pez Obrador, has said before that he believes that 90% of phone calls reporting domestic violence are false. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I asked Cordero Cabrera whether, over the past few years, the government and the authorities have been paying more attention to femicide and violence against women, and whether they have been helping organizations such as Casa Amiga. \u201cThat\u2019s a very interesting question that we\u2019ve been reflecting on these past few years,\u201d she responds, \u201cIn my experience, a few years ago, when Esther started, you know that she documents it and she says it, that the government was against it. They hindered, threatened, discredited us, and were against what we were doing,\u201d she recollects. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In the past few years, Cordero Cabrera says that there has been an \u201cinteresting phenomena.\u201d She refers to it being almost like a simulation. \u201cThey [the government] say that they do things. In speeches they can say \u2018Bravo Casa Amiga for the work that you are doing! We recognize what you do!\u2019 They recognize the fight, but when it\u2019s time to do something, they don\u2019t do it.\u201d She acknowledges that the government no longer discredits Casa Amiga publicly, and that they no longer organize campaigns against them, but \u201cthey say that they are working, but in reality, they are not.\u201d She is extremely frustrated over the government’s inaction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Although the government is not taking action against violence against women, Cordero Cabrera says that the government and politicians use the topic to their political advantage. \u201cThey say \u2018yes it\u2019s true, yes femicides exist, we are working on them.\u2019 Now they are utilizing the conversation as their political message.\u201d She used the female governor of Chihuahua, Mar\u00eda Eugenia Campos Galv\u00e1n, as an example. During election season, Cordero Cabrera remembers that Galv\u00e1n would promote standing in solidarity with women and putting an end to femicide. \u201cShe comes into government and she forgets all of that,\u201d she remarks. Galv\u00e1n has not followed through on her campaign promise to fight for women.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNow the conversation is just to pull people to their party,\u201d Cordero Cabrera states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey translate effective policies for women,\u201d she continues, \u201cTo give you an example, the coordinator of CONAVIM, [el Comisi\u00f3n Nacional para Prevenir y Erradicar la Violencia Contra las Mujeres] says in a speech that \u2018We\u2019re going to work with organizations, we have to support them, we recognize their work, we must walk together,\u2019 but then they take out campaigns or actions that hinder the work of the organizations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Publically, the government can be seen as supporting organizations such as Casa Amiga, but Cordero Cabrera reveals that their supposed support has only made them keep a closer eye on organizations. \u201cMore and more the organizations are audited. We are more under the magnifying glass.\u201d Smaller organizations have had to shut down due to government interference. Cordero Cabrera takes the government\u2019s and authorities\u2019 support with a grain of salt, \u201cIn speeches they can say one thing, but their actions say otherwise.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n According to Cordero Cabrera, the government lies not only about supporting organizations, but they also invent statistics to make it seem as though they are working to end violence against women. \u201cThey use statistics, and that is the perverse thing that is happening, because they use statistics where it says, \u2018we create care centers, this many psychologists work in Ciudad Ju\u00e1rez,\u2019 and it is not true. They inflate numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The government is not adding more laws to crack down on violence against women, but they are also not enforcing the laws that already exist: \u201cThe laws are there, but they are not properly enforced. So to answer your question, \u2018what does the government do?\u2019 they changed the conversation, but they still do nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n When asked what she wishes the public knew about femicides and violence against women, Corder Cabrera answered, \u201cWe definitely have to make public that all of the institutions that have access to justice are overflowing [with cases], and that femicides and violence against women continue to exist.\u201d Justice for the women of Mexico is simply not possible under these conditions. My great-aunt fought with the government and investigators to advance cases of femicide. 13 years after her death, Casa Amiga still faces the same problem. \u201cThe investigations still do not advance,\u201d she says. \u201cThat is still the message to be said.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Heartbreakingly, \u201cAccess to justice, in reality, does not exist for the women in Mexico and in Ju\u00e1rez.\u201d Cordero Cabrera senses that the lack of action from authorities gives abusers a high sense of impunity. \u201cIt\u2019s a public message that aggressors can kill women and girls and have no consequences.\u201d Off the top of her head, Cordero Cabrera knows of ten public ministries that each have almost a thousand cases. The lack of manpower makes it impossible for justice to be served. Cordero Cabrera does not believe that the judicial and political systems have the capacity to stop the violence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She stresses that Casa Amiga\u2019s lawyers accompany victims to meetings with the authorities. If they go without a lawyer, she says, \u201cthey [the authorities] do not listen to them. [the authorities] minimize the situations they live. A woman who is alone in Ju\u00e1rez, who doesn\u2019t go accompanied by an organization, suffers again.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The main question is why do femicides happen at such alarming rates? Why are Mexican women abused so frequently? Cordero Cabrera believes that violence against women is a direct correlation of Mexican culture. \u201cThis machista, patriarchal culture predominates in M\u00e9xico. It continues to be a culture that permeates the education of women and children.\u201d Cordero Cabrera says that from as early as infancy, men learn to appropriate women\u2019s bodies. \u201cThey believe that they are the owners of women\u2019s bodies.\u201d That belief, she continues, allows them to perpetrate unimaginable violence. \u201cThey do it because they can, because the system allows them to. It\u2019s a patriarchal system.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n However indoctrinated the men of Mexico may be, Cordero Cabrera highlights impunity as the biggest problem. \u201cThere are no examples of punishment. The social message is that men can keep doing it, because nothing will happen.\u201d Men will \u201ccontinue threatening women, and tell them that they will dismember them, disappear them,\u201d because they know that they will not be held accountable. Cordero Cabrera wonders why this does not happen in other countries, but she answers her own question. \u201cBecause in Mexico, we keep forming men that believe they are the owners of women\u2019s bodies.\u201d The violence and culture is passed from generation to generation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cordero Cabrera sees another fault in the system: prevention. \u201cPrevention is completely absent,\u201d she affirms, \u201cWe are not attacking the root of the problem in education, in the patriarchal system, in work with children, boys, and men from an early age.\u201d Prevention is neglected, she believes, because it does not produce immediate results. For prevention to work, it needs to be invested in for a long period of time. It is a long term solution, but \u201cthe government doesn\u2019t do it because, politically, it leaves no results.\u201d They want visible solutions, she explains, solutions that will help them get elected. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to stop the violence if we don\u2019t invest in long term prevention.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Casa Amiga is crucial to saving the women of Mexico. Their work is revolutionary. I am honored to have spoken with Lidia Cordero Cabrera as she carries out my great-aunt\u2019s legacy. This article is part of an Independent Study on Femicide in Mexico. Attached is Casa Amiga\u2019s PayPal. Casa Amiga relies on donations to offer its services. Please consider donating to this amazing organization. Every donation goes towards saving the women of Mexico. No amount is too small. https:\/\/www.paypal.com\/paypalme\/casaamiga<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Casa Amiga Esther Ch\u00e1vez Cano was founded by my great-aunt, Esther Ch\u00e1vez Cano, in 1999 in Ciudad Ju\u00e1rez, Mexico. It was the state of Chihuahua\u2019s first comprehensive support and safe haven organization for women and children experiencing familial and domestic violence, as well as sexual violence. Ch\u00e1vez Cano wrote in her book, Esther Ch\u00e1vez Cano: Construyendo Caminos y Esperanzas, that Casa Amiga \u201cidentifies as feminist because it is based on the ideological precepts of feminism<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":295,"featured_media":7344,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[318],"tags":[],"coauthors":[418],"class_list":["post-7343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/Screen-Shot-2023-03-06-at-10.54.53-PM.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/295"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7343"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7345,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7343\/revisions\/7345"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7343"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=7343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/lh6.googleusercontent.com\/7H3bz8RGgg7Wm4V5r0l41hO44g0ijgzUCTUIA9kzai-MAMSNrdW7-j9Fno3TP5C6zSPOGU3KUXKLnelS5HW21nXKF8cnDV8Gi6H-ab6Y4po-_WxjknkKKdMr102Z3TTlc1gsOsvyXFZrLJhsL7DrRr0\")
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