The #Spasime movement (translated as #SaveMe movement) is a 2019
Croatian
social movement
A social movement is a loosely organized effort by a large group of people to achieve a particular goal, typically a social or political one. This may be to carry out a social change, or to resist or undo one. It is a type of group action and may ...
which fights domestic violence, and is an example of the
MeToo effect.
Background and origin
The #Spasime movement was launched on Facebook in March 2019, and in 2 weeks gathered more than 46,000 supporters online. The movement has been supported by many Croatian celebrities, among others actress and screenwriter
Jelena Veljača, who was one of the main organisers behind the protests that followed, organised by the movement. Veljača said she started the #Spasime hashtag 'driven by the incredible wave of violence spreading across Croatia' and that she had been especially shocked by the news about a father in
Pag (island) who threw his children off a balcony.
Vanja Deželić, a journalist for the Croatian news sit
vijesti.hr compared the #Spasime movement to the
You Know Me movement which started two months after the Spasime movement, in May 2019, and is a movement by
abortion rights advocates to fight
abortion stigma. Deželić wrote that
anti-abortion movements had become more active in Croatia and were aiming for similar law changes such as the 2019
Heartbeat bill that passed in Alabama. Deželić stated that resistance against these anti-abortion movements could happen in Croatia based on the #YouKnowMe movement and thanks to
Busy Philipps.
Protests

On 16 March 2019, in a protest organised by the #Spasime movement, several thousand Croats demonstrated in
Zagreb,
Split,
Šibenik and
Dubrovnik, against domestic violence. Croatian Prime Minister
Andrej Plenkovic participated in one of the demonstrations, stating "I'm here less as the Prime Minister and more as a concerned citizen."
See also
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2019 Croatian protests
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Domestic violence
Domestic violence (also known as domestic abuse or family violence) is violence or other abuse that occurs in a domestic setting, such as in a marriage or cohabitation. ''Domestic violence'' is often used as a synonym for ''intimate partner ...
*
Hashtag activism
*
Me Too movement
*
Ele Não movement
The #EleNão (Portuguese language, Portuguese for "not him") movement, also known as the protests against Jair Bolsonaro, were Demonstration (political), demonstrations led by women which took place in several regions of Brazil and, with less int ...
*
You Know Me movement
References
{{Portal bar, Feminism, Human sexuality, Internet, Society
2019 establishments in Croatia
2019 in Internet culture
2019 in women's history
21st-century social movements
Feminism in Croatia
Feminist movements and ideologies
Hashtags
Internet-based activism
Phrases