On Wednesday, April 27th, the Irwindale Police Department and the city of Irwindale took part in “Denim Day 2016," a campaign by the organization “Peace Over Violence” designed to raise awareness to the impact of sexual violence.
City employees were invited to wear denim jeans to work for the day and our police officers donned their "Class C" uniforms consisting of "jeans and polo shirts" in lieu of their regular duty uniforms.
In the afternoon, our residents joined our police officers, Irwindale City Council member H. Manual Ortiz, and other city of Irwindale employees for a walk around the Irwindale Civic Center and Irwindale City Park to promote our city's participation in the "Denim Day" campaign. Representatives from “Peace Over Violence” attended the event and also took part in the walk. Everyone participating in the walk wore their denim jeans in honor of "Denim Day".
The Irwindale Police Officers Association (IPOA) also presented a check to Peace Over Violence to support their sexual and domestic violence, stalking, child abuse and youth violence prevention programs.
The "Denim Day" campaign was originally triggered by a ruling by the Italian Supreme Court where a rape conviction was overturned because the justices felt that since the victim was wearing tight jeans she must have helped her rapist remove her jeans, thereby implying consent. The following day, the women in the Italian Parliament came to work wearing jeans in solidarity with the victim.
“Peace Over Violence” developed the "Denim Day" campaign in response to this case and the activism surrounding it. Since then, wearing jeans on "Denim Day" has become a symbol of protest against erroneous and destructive attitudes about sexual assault. For more info about Denim Day, please visit their website: www.denimdayinfo.org
We are proud of our residents and everyone at "Team Irwindale" who took part in today's events and supported this worthwhile campaign.