Dear Community Member,
Welcome to World Vasectomy Day. Thank you.
There are a lot of causes you can join and many important issues, but if you’ve come this far, we hope you’ll consider being part of ours. What makes WVD unique, and I venture to say successful, is our commitment to create a collectively created movement. We don’t stop at the vasectomy, we use it as a jumping off point to pursue positive social change and make for a kinder and more compassionate world.
To get there we depend on the participation of thousands including:
- Passionate vasectomy providers – including doctors, urologists, gynecologists and in some countries, nurse practitioners.
- Family planning and sexual and reproductive health experts, specialists and advocates.
- Men who have chosen a vasectomy and men who choose to get one.
- Women who support their partners – and friends, brothers, and sons.
Why a movement and not just a program?
Instead of programs or campaigns that last only as long as the funding, WVD continues to grow because it is a participatory and interactive experience whose growth depends on the collective pursuit of a shared goal.
Be it to gain control over your own fertility and provide that opportunity for others, to lower humanity’s carbon footprint, to improve gender relations, to encourage more compassion or to share the responsibility of family planning with women, at the heart of our movement is a ritual of personal commitment and, to a certain degree, sacrifice. Our goal is not just to increase the number of men who get a vasectomy, but to convert this powerful and personal choice into collective action.
To achieve this overall objective, World Vasectomy Day, combines traditional storytelling with interactive technologies to link acts of love into a collective movement for social good.
We achieve success when we inspire men who have had a vasectomy to champion the procedure to their brothers, friends and neighbors. We increase our impact when women join in and participate in critical conversations that are rarely shared. We develop technical capacity through a global network of vasectomy providers who exchange and share knowledge. We attract the best and brightest storytellers, some of whom are professional filmmakers, but many of whom are merely creative and conscientious people. We work with institutions, organizations and governments to achieve scale.
And when all of this comes together, change happens!
How did it begin?
It was on May 9th, 2012, after recording my 100th plus tale of men explaining that they had chosen a vasectomy out of love for their children, their partners and the planet that I set an intention to convince 100 doctors in 20 countries to do 1000 vasectomies in 24 hours. Within 24 hours I had reserved the url, www.worldvasectomyday.org and our movement was launched.
Today, 7+ years later, with more than 1000 participating providers, we are the largest male focused family planning movements in history…and growing!
What has WVD grown into?
It is a social media communications project that unites men, vasectomy providers and health care activists in a collective mission to increase men’s participation in sexual and reproductive health.
It is the vasectomy-provider community linked by a list-serve, where doctors share practical information and successful solutions to common challenges.
It is a once-a-year ‘vasectomy-thon’ in which vasectomy providers throughout the world provide high quality vasectomies to men whose families are complete.
It is a live-stream program that is shared across multiple time zones with contributions from men getting vasectomies, vasectomy providers, leaders in family planning, contributions from wives, partners and mothers as well as documentaries and animations produced over the year.
It is an opportunity to educate men and women about a variety of family planning options.
It is a week long event that is produced from our rotating headquarters where we work with local providers and health care providers to build sustainable vasectomy programs.
It is a symposium where the best and the brightest share their knowledge and experience with next generation leaders.
It is a year round effort that builds awareness through communication and community, through collective effort by creating strategic alliances with Ministries of Health, Family Planning organizations and conscientious individuals.
It is an ongoing movement that harnesses the best in men and channels their commitment to build more respectful and more equitable gender relations.
It is the largest male-oriented sexual and reproductive health event ever!
It is a community of activists seeking new ways to work as one towards a brighter future for all.
If we’re going to achieve our purpose we need you to join us and in helping build that future!
Sincerely,
Jonathan Stack, Co Founder World Vasectomy Day