Free Live Show A LOVE THING Will Share Performances and Tips to Create Healthy Relationships and Prevent Harmful Ones

A FREE live show on February 5 at 7pm, A LOVE THING, will share moving performances and music, empowering conversation, and practical tips and tools for ways teens and young adults - and we all - can create healthier relationships and prevent harmful ones.

A LOVE THING is the first popup event of 2020 to follow last Spring's inaugural #HealMeToo Festival, and is co-sponsored by The Mayor's Office to End Domestic and Gender-Based Violence (ENDGBV), The Angel Band Project and The Tank, where the show will be performed.

To reserve FREE tickets, visit bit.ly/hm2lovething.

The program will be taped live for the #HealMeToo Podcast and features young adult performers and activists. Highlights include spoken word poet Jovan Martinez and community educator Cassity Yeye of the City's Early Relationship Abuse Prevention Program, as well as an exclusive preview of an original Song of Survival by Vanessa Marie and a healing choral improvisation led by Music Therapist Katie Down, both of The Angel Band Project.

At the heart of this unique event honoring Teen Dating Violence Prevention Month: a panel discussion with young adult activists and staff about the powerful work of ENDGBV's Healthy Relationship Training Academy and the City's Relationship Abuse Prevention Program. During the Q&A, audience members are welcome to remain anonymous for the podcast.

The recording of A LOVE THING will be released on Valentine's Day as the Premiere Episode of #HealMeToo Podcast Season 2: Relationships. Season 2 will include 10 full-length episodes that provide stories, insights and tools to help survivors and our allies experience Healthier Relationships - whether at work, in our communities, within our own bodies and ourselves, or in our intimate sexual lives.

Building on the 12 full-length episodes in #HealMeToo Podcast Season 1, Season 2 will continue pairing original performances with expert advice and artist and activist interviews. Throughout March and April, which span Women's History Month, International Women's Day, and Sexual Assault Awareness Month, Season 2 will air 10 full-length episodes that provide: sex & relationship advice, anti-harassment workplace strategies, trauma-informed dance and movement techniques, music therapy exercises, community-based practices of Restorative Justice, and more.

The #HealMeToo Podcast & Festival were founded by the survivor, theater artist, activist and podcast host, Hope Singsen, to create an intersectional space for conversation that prompts healing and cultural change. Singsen finds inspiration in Tarana Burke's "metoo." Movement, which since 2006 has been empowering survivors of sexual violence through empathy.

"In the journey to 'heal' the epidemic of harassment, sexual violence, and childhood sexual abuse that sparked survivors everywhere to start posting #MeToo, so much depends on transforming our relationships," says Singsen. "By definition, sexual violence happens in relationships. It creates what therapists call 'relational trauma,' and can change a survivor's experiences of dating, sex, and love, but also our ability to feel safe and to exercise our power in the world at large. What's more, power discrepancies in relationships, such as between a supervisor and employee, or between more and less privileged groups, often sets the stage for abuse in the first place."

The #HealMeToo Podcast & Festival have also built on the conversation started by NOW-NYC and RAINN's #HealMeToo campaign, which provided survivors of sexual violence with resources to get help and speak out about their experiences.

"By presenting live events that invite bravely honest, intersectional conversations," Singsen says, "and by offering listeners practical tools that may enrich and inform their own conversations about trauma and healing, as well as structural inequity, privilege, accountability, and social justice, I hope the #HealMeToo Podcast & Festival can support the broader movement to heal in our lives and our culture - one relationship at a time."

#HealMeToo Podcast originally launched in the summer of 2019 to share recorded events from the first-ever #HealMeToo Festival, a multi-disciplinary exploration of gendered and sexual violence and how it can be healed. As covered in Ms. Magazine Online, Playbill, and other outlets, for three weeks in spring of 2019, more than 190 intersectional artists and experts gathered at NYC's West Village IRT Theater to present 30 performances, panels and participatory workshops, with sponsorship from the New York Women's Foundation and The Art Therapy Project.

The Mayor's Office to End Domestic and Gender-Based Violence (ENDGBV) develops policies and programs, provides training and prevention education, conducts research and evaluations, performs community outreach, and operates the New York City Family Justice Centers. We collaborate with City agencies and community stakeholders to ensure access to inclusive services for survivors of domestic and gender-based violence (GBV). The NYC Family Justice Centers are co-located multidisciplinary service centers providing vital social services, civil legal, and criminal justice assistance for survivors of domestic and gender-based violence and their children-all under one roof.

The Angel Band Project is a national nonprofit dedicated to supporting survivors of sexual violence on their path to healing through innovative music therapy programming. Music therapy is the specialized use of music by a credentialed professional with a therapeutic goal in mind. It can help address social, communicative, emotional, physical, cognitive, sensory and spiritual needs. We use the power of music to provide healing, raise awareness and create positive social change for survivors of sexual violence.

People experiencing relationship abuse can find information and resources at nyc.gov/nychope.

Get FREE Tickets to A LOVE THING on February 5 at The Tank: bit.ly/hm2lovething