Aug

This Startup Is Giving Women a Fighting Chance

August 26th, 2015

"While I’ve been staying here the experiences we have seen are totally heartbreaking with the rape, especially as a mother," said a South African woman staying in a refugee camp, the location of a recent Kuros!™ pepper spray drop. "Our girls are not safe and are getting attacked here. We are not safe. We are even being attacked in our homes. We are being turned into victims."

With law enforcement so far away from the camp, men with bad intentions have free reign over unprotected women whose male counterparts are off working. Seeing conditions like these during his travels around the world, Kuro Tawil decided to make it his mission to help women take safety into their own hands. To achieve his goal of empowering women at high risk of sexual assault, Tawil launched Kuros!, a company centered on distributing free pepper spray to women in need.

Kuros! partners with nongovernmental organizations in foreign countries, ensuring the startup’s ability to reach at-risk populations, to coordinate pepper spray drops. So far, successful drops have been executed in South Africa, India, and - just this past weekend - El Salvador.

Photo: Kuro Tawil

"I feel that we are extremely fortunate to be able to help these women who are already so strong finally get the protection they deserve,” said Tawil. “The ability to protect yourself with a can of pepper spray can make all the difference in a woman’s life. Especially when she is the victim of unfortunate circumstances. We’ve seen drastic improvements in these women's self-esteem and confidence levels, and nothing could be more gratifying."

Kuro Tawil talks with Salvadoran women after a pepper spray demonstration coordinated with Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad, a nongovernmental organization in El Salvador.

El Salvador is just one country in the world, a world where one in four women are victims of sexual assault (U.N.). With a projected eight billion people inhabiting the planet in 2024, in less than a decade, one billion of the world’s women will experience sexual violence sometime in their lives. For now, we can start small, empowering one woman at a time. Get more information on sexual assault worldwide.