When Police Constable Michael Sanguinetti suggested that “women should avoid dressing like sl*ts in order not to be victimized,” he ignited the fire in women across the city of Toronto, Canada. Sanguinetti’s “sl*t” comment empowered women to unite and create the first Sl*t Walk in February 2011.

Each year, Central Connecticut’s Ruthe Boyea Women’s Center curates their own Walk of No Shame to help women and men across campus rally together for women empowerment and equality.

Jacqueline Cobbina-Boivin, director of the Women’s Center, hoped the event helped empower young women to dress how they want without the fear of getting hurt.

“They have the right to wear whatever they want to wear and they at no time are the cause to why rape happens,” Cobbina-Boivin said.

Julia Ferraguto, a CCSU senior and senior coordinator for violence against women programs at the Women’s Center, began the night by saying that women “stand together as one to condemn policies that embolden and condone rape culture and call out the disproportionate impact this has on un-marginalized groups.”

Organizations such as the CCSU Police Department, the Counseling and Wellness Center, the LGBT Center and the YWCA of New Britain, were also in attendance to show their support in the fight against sexual violence.

This year’s event welcomed international gallery artist, Olivia Nguyen, known better as FiyaBomb, as the keynote speaker. She shared her story of uneasy beginnings, her current life as an artist and how she uses her art to empower others.

Nguyen, a Hartford native, graduated from CCSU in 2013 as an art major with a minor in marketing. She would trudge down the hill from Gallaudet Residence to Maloney Hall, thinking to herself, “What am I doing here? Why haven’t I dropped out?” But even when art professors said her work “wasn’t aesthetically pleasing,” and attempted to convince her to change majors, Nguyen persevered.

“I went to school to be a studio artist. That’s what I wanted to do [and] that’s what I was empowered to do,” she proudly stated.

Now, six years later, Nguyen has held over 150 art showcases nationwide and has a lengthy celebrity clientele list, including famous names like Big Sean, Drake, Spike Lee, Travis Scott and many more.

“I just wanted to share my story so people can change their story, the stories they don’t like, the stories they want to edit about their own life. I wanted people to leave with hope,” Nguyen said.

Hope and the feeling of empowerment is exactly what CCSU social work major, Julia Ferraguto, left with.

“It empowers me because it gives me a sense of purpose,” Ferraguto explained. “People tell me all the time, ‘You’ll never really make the same money that a businessman makes.’ [But] I chose to do what I’m passionate about, which is helping people.”

Ferraguto says Nguyen’s life experiences show that “just because you’re doing what you love doesn’t mean you aren’t going to be successful or make money, you can still do it and you have it in you.”

Nguyen continues to share her life experiences with her followers on social media to inspire them. She proudly labels herself as a socially active feminist, looking for equality for both men and women.

During the event, Nguyen recalled seeing the “sl*t” comment by Sanguinetti and thinking, “That was the most ignorant thing I’ve ever heard.”

“I have to cover my figure because it makes you uncomfortable? That’s not fair, and even if I do cover it, what gives you the reason [that] someone will stop raping women?” Nguyen said.

She encourages women to take control of their bodies and love themselves and others.

“You are more than welcome to have sex, as an adult, with whoever you want to have sex with, men and women [because] that’s equality. Feminism is the equality of both men and women, we have to vouch for men as well. Things only change when they stand behind us,” Nguyen stated.

Nguyen ended the night by sharing a story of a personal male friend who was date-raped by a woman.

“We hear those stories and think, ‘What, you didn’t like it?’ or, ‘How is that possible?’ But it is,” she said. “It’s something that not only women live with, [but] it’s something men live with, too. A man has to remember thinking, ‘A woman took advantage of me and I didn’t like it.’”

Nguyen hopes to continue to be “an additional vessel to [women’s] lives.” She wants to be able to help guide them in the direction that is best for them, she said.