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Green Dot: Airmen combat interpersonal violence

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Destinee Sweeney
  • 20th Fighter Wing Public Affairs
SHAW AIR FORCE BASE, S.C. --  From day one of basic military training, Airmen are taught to support and rely on their wingman.

The trust between wingmen to keep each other safe and do what is best for the other’s wellbeing, whether on base or on the battlefield, can affect the success of the mission.

However, doing the right thing may not always be easy due to personal barriers such as shyness; barriers that can be addressed using the tools Airmen learn in their annual Green Dot training.

The Green Dot program is aimed at preventing power-based interpersonal violence—sexual assault, domestic violence, and stalking. Airmen receive training on Green Dot violence prevention tools from other Airmen who are trained as Green Dot implementers, promoting peer-to-peer communication and wingman intervention.

“The goal is to reduce the number of interpersonal cases of violence,” said Master Sgt. Crystal Malave, 20th Maintenance Group maintenance training section chief and Green Dot coordinator.

Part of the training is learning what a green dot is. “Green Dots” are situations where someone proactively or reactively takes action to decrease interpersonal violence, as opposed to “Red Dots” which are a single choice someone makes to cause harm to another.

Although situations and their warning signs can vary, Green Dot shows individuals with varying comfort zones that they have different ways they can intervene: direct, delegate, or distract.

“In the training, we give them ways to come up with realistic options for them when they’re facing their barriers,” said Malave.

The direct option is for the intervener to directly get involved to stop the act from happening such as confronting the perpetrator about their behavior.

For a person who may be uncomfortable directly engaging others, Green Dot teaches them options like being able to delegate the task of intervening to another person, such as calling the police.

Finally, an intervener can attempt to distract the person involved. This could be causing a scene or starting a conversation with the people involved.

There are also proactive ways for individuals to start creating change in their community.

“One of the examples, as you’ve probably seen around base, are the magnets,” said Patricia Breen, 20th Fighter Wing Specialist for the Primary Prevention of Violence. “One of the proactive actions Airmen can engage in is displaying one of these magnets somewhere so someone says ‘What is that?’ and they get to tell them about the program. It’s basically sending a message that they’re not going to tolerate violence.”

Malave said proactive green dots set two norms: making it clear violence will not be tolerated and that Airmen on the installation look out for each other and get involved.

Although no individual can do it alone, by taking proactive and reactive steps, Airmen can work to reduce the amount of power-based interpersonal violence in their community and increase the amount of Green Dots.