The Russian Crisis Center for Women "ANNA" is aimed at combating all types of violence against women and children. Anna was the first organization in the country to create a hotline for women who're suffering from domestic violence. “Anna” is involved in promoting the rights of women, conducts educational and enlightening work, conducts research and monitors violations throughout the country, prepares reports for international organizations (UN Committee).

Our basic goal for the project was to draw public attention to the problem of domestic violence in Russia and the absence of the law. Meanwhile, the law on domestic violence was already in force in 127 countries.

Our project mission was to influence the earliest possible adoption of the law against domestic violence in Russia. The law should protect the rights of citizens facing domestic violence and contain preventive measures to reduce cases.

In Russia, there is no law that protects the rights of citizens facing domestic violence.

Every year, law enforcement authorities record 224,000 beatings in Russian families.

Every third murder happens within the family.

To influence the fastest possible adoption of the law, we created an interactive experience: in one of the largest markets in Moscow, we installed the Boxer arcade - a symbol of violence. Market visitors gladly took the opportunity to find out the power of their punch for free, but instead of prize points videos of women, portraying victims of violence, appeared on the screen, urging players to sign a petition for the adoption of the law against domestic violence.

We conducted an analysis to study the problem of domestic violence and official statistics were collected for Russia: a third of the murders are committed in the family or in domestic relations. Violent acts in one form or another occur in every fourth family.

We have studied the legal and legislative framework in Russia governing domestic violence. It was concluded: in Russia there is no clearly formulated law that would regulate issues of domestic violence and protect the rights of Russian citizens in this matter.

Our work was aimed at all citizens and government officials of the Russian Federation (State Duma of Russian Federation). With no media budget, the solution should have been catchy and publication-worthy.

We decided to cooperate with a popular public place and install the machine there.

We installed the boxer machine for two and a half months at Moskvoretsky Market, starting in August. Over eight thousand people punched the machine. The action was filmed and became viral in the Russian media. The petition was signed over 910 000 times and we caught the attention of our parliament.

The petition “For the law against domestic violence in Russia” received over 910 000 signatures and every day the number is growing. The bill was submitted to the Parliament (State Duma) of the Russian Federation. Now the parliament is working on the text of the bill.

The total number of impressions of The Punch project amounted to more than 146 million throughout Russia. Our project received over 12,300 publications in the media.

The Punch made it possible for people to realize how urgent the problem of domestic violence is in Russia today. During the action, none of the participants tried to hit the bag for a second time.