The final ceremony of the STEP UP! Youth Video AWARD competition took place on 27 February in one of the many rooms of the European Parliament. The award ceremony was made possible thanks to the Green / EFS parliamentary group which accepted WAVE's proposal to give the ceremony a European breath; the seat, therefore, where if not at the heart of the European institutions?

It is 18.30 pm in Brussels it is very cold and it rains but the small oval room is full of light and hope from all the very young finalists. The evening begins with opening speeches by Ulrike Lunacek, vice-president of the European parliament, Monika Vana member of the Women's Rights commission, Rosa Logar president of WAVE and member of the GREVIO committee and finally a young parliamentarian Terry Reintke elected at just 27 years and engaged in the fight against LGBTQ gender discrimination.

After the screening of the finalist videos from 7 European countries: Serbia, Italy, Montenegro, Austria, Germany, Portugal and Finland, short questions from the jury to the winners on the type of message they wanted to launch in the 3 minutes available and on the origin of the idea.

The videos are all very beautiful and different in the way of transmitting the message to say enough to gender violence: who focuses on verbal violence, who on psychological violence. Much to the surprise, the video of Serbia was shot by 2 guys who wanted to change the mentality of their friends' approach towards women.

Finally the long awaited moment "THE AWARDS". The word goes to the jurors who proclaim the video the winner for the absolute number of views obtained through Youtube “Atitude em movement”Of Portugal shot by Joana do Mar Ferreira Machado with 6000 views in one month.

While the jury proclaims our Luciana Trulio as the winner as the best European video with “portami via”, The 5 juror directors from different countries admired the pathos and the clear message launched by our video.

It is with a glass of prosecco that from Brussels we drink a toast for Luciana, all for those who believed with me in the Italian video competition "WE SEE THE VIOLENCE", at the Step Up Campaign! it's at D.i.Re.

Youth Video Award winners of the 7 participating countries:

 

Alice degl'Innocenti
Vivere Donna Association, Carpi