Behind Closed Doors is a public education campaign by Aura Freedom shedding light on the femicide emergency occurring every 48 hours in Canada. This campaign focuses on Intimate Partner and Familial Femicide and the reality that women and girls are most often killed by the men closest to them – by men they share a home with.
According to the Canadian Femicide Observatory’s 2024 #CallItFemicide report, “77% of women and girls killed in Canada were killed in a private location, such as their own home, home of the accused, or the home they shared with the accused.”
OAITH’s More Than A Number report, covering femicides in Ontario in 2021 and 2022, also confirms that, “femicide victims continue to be most commonly killed inside or outside of a residence, which could belong to the victim, the perpetrator or both.”
Why 'behind closed doors'?
Because the data doesn’t lie.
Femicide most often occurs behind the very doors meant to keep women and girls safe – the doors of their own home. Intimate partner and familial femicide are the most common forms of femicide in Canada, with most victims murdered by husbands, boyfriends, fathers, sons, brothers, uncles, and other men they are meant to be safest with.
In 2024, 77.5% of femicides in Canada were intimate partner or familial femicides. And yet, these types of femicide continue to be hidden, unrecognized, and misunderstood.
Because femicide disproportionately occurs in “private” spaces and within relationships, it is often treated as a private matter, rather than a wider societal issue and deeply systemic form of gender-based violence.
By treating femicide as something that happens behind closed doors, society and systems are left unaccountable.
In Canada, 44% of women and girls have experienced some form of intimate partner violence, yet are socially and systemically silenced for many reasons.
We know stigma, shame, fear of criminalization, fear of being separated from children, safety issues, and many more valid reasons, keep women from disclosing their experiences of violence.
Further, separation is regarded as the most dangerous time for a woman experiencing intimate partner violence, with 77% of intimate partner femicides occurring upon separation, and a 75% increase of violence upon separation for at least two years, according to Battered Women’s Support Services.
Indigenous women and girls experience the highest rates of violence
Children are the unseen victims of femicide
and are also at risk
Learn more about femicide and Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls and Two Spirit Peoples on our Femicide Knowledge Hub created with the Canadian Femicide Observatory for Justice and Accountability and the Native Women’s Resource Centre of Toronto.
DONATE TO END VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMENA Call to Action
Building community support in Toronto and across Canada to end femicide.
Aura Freedom’s Behind Closed Doors campaign is calling on all advocates, survivors and allies to tie a purple ribbon to their front doors at different times throughout 2025, starting with May 24 and 25, which is also the weekend of Doors Open Toronto. Similarly to how Doors Open Toronto gives the public access to spaces that aren’t usually accessible, the Behind Closed Doors campaign seeks to bring what is happening in spaces we can’t see to the forefront of conversations around violence against women and femicide.
Our pink door installation will be travelling to different locations in Toronto and Ontario, starting with Nathan Phillips Square in May and continuing into the Hall, including inside Toronto City Hall for the 16 Days of Activism to End Gender-Based Violence.
We are calling on Toronto residents, and residents in other cities across Canada, to “open the conversation on femicide” by using their doors to send a message of solidarity, support survivors and, ultimately, prevent the rising rates of femicide happening behind closed doors in Toronto and beyond.
Tie a purple ribbon on your door during the 16 Days of Activism to End GBV (Nov 25 to Dec 10) to show your support for ending femicide in Canada. Tag @aurafreedom and #BehindClosedDoors on social media!
Are you or someone you know experiencing violence?
Aura Freedom would also like to thank Forsman & Bodenfors and Veritas for their partnership, creative brilliance, and compassion. From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you for walking alongside us with empathy and curiosity during the creation of the Behind Closed Doors campaign, and for all your work to end violence against women and femicide in Canada.