Women are forced to take on both wage and social reproductive labor, then made to negotiate this contradiction individually. Second-wave feminism tried to change that.
The “women’s wage gap,” the 80 cents that American women make for every dollar made by men, has long been a subject of debate for feminists, with each proposed contributing factor begging its own set of policy fixes.Those who argue that women’s lagging wages are rooted in gendered prejudice might support equal pay laws mandating salary parity or encourage women to negotiate aggressively. see also: New Feminist General Strike on 8th March 2019 – Spanish StateIf the demands of motherhood are holding women back professionally, potential salves include subsidizing childcare, pushing fathers to assume a more active parenting role, or having more flexible, family-friendly workplaces. Continue reading “Feminism in the US … still No Way to Equal Pay and free Child Care”
CNT calls for rebellion against the Patriarchal State and its courts
The anarcho-syndicalist trade union shows its indignation at the judicial resolution adopted in the case of “La Manada” the self styled ‘wolf pack’.
”The CNT union has shown its absolute “dismay and disgust” before the performance of the Navarra Court that has decreed the provisional release of the members of “La Manada” . “We share the anger and call to turn indignation into a permanent struggle against the patriarchal system that the State carries in its genes,” said the anarcho-syndicalist organization.”Being Afraid is gonna Switch Sides.. Feminist Self Defense …Platform for Free Abortion and Sexuality’‘
In the same way, the CNT has warned that what happened around “La Manada” once again puts in focus an unquestionable reality: “for what and for whom courts and prisons are made”. “That same judicial system is the one that pursues and ruins the lives of eight young people of Altsasu thanks to a police assembly, or also the one that persecutes rappers and criminalizes social protest,” the union stressed.
“Justice is nothing other than injustice, and the State is nothing more than a gigantic macho, violent and patriarchal apparatus,” they said. In this context, the CNT has also called for a “reflection” on the current system, “a system that breeds monsters like the members of La Manada and places in the courts of ‘injustice’ machista and misogynist judges.”
The anarcho-syndicalist union showed its ” support and affection” towards all the militants of the feminist movement that today take to the streets “to shout against this injustice and defend their rights”. “You, sisters, are essential and indispensable to build another model of society, freer and more human,” they remarked.‘We are the wolf pack’
Protests as Spanish court releases ‘wolf pack’ rapist predators
Five men who were convicted only for sexual assault after a gang rape of a woman at a Spanish bull-running festival have now been released on bail pending appeal, sparking fresh protests.
One of the accused is a Guardia Civil (Franco’s military police) and another was in the army. Several are far right “ultras” who support FC Sevilla.
Protesters have taken to the streets of Spain after a court ordered the release on bail of five men sentenced to nine years in prison for sexually abusing a young woman at Pamplona’s bull-running festival.‘Hitting a Guardia Civil gets 13 yrs jail. A Guardia Civil and 4 friends rape you and walk free’.
The men, who called themselves “the wolf pack” in a WhatsApp messaging group, had been accused of stalking, abducting and raping a woman, then 18, at the entrance to an apartment building in Pamplona on July 7, 2016, at the start of the week-long San Fermin festival, which draws tens of thousands of visitors.
All five were convicted only of sexual abuse in April and were acquitted of the more serious crime of sexual assault, which includes rape, as the court did not consider that the victim had been subjected to intimidation or violence, sparking nationwide protests.
Coming shortly after the first ever feminist General Strike the verdict by a politicized Spanish Court is seen as direct repression and yet another example of patriarchal approval for the rampant neo fascist mentality and impunity for a far right gang including a paramilitary police officer who boasted of their crime on Whats App and mocked their victim.
Photos of some of the Demos around Iberia
Manifestación en Pamplona en protesta por la puesta en libertad bajo fianza de los cinco miembros de ‘La Manada’.
Concentración contra la puesta en libertad de ‘la manada’ en Cuenca.
Manifestación en Madrid contra la puesta en libertad de la manada.
Cientos de personas se concentran en Sevilla contra la puesta en libertad de los miembros de la manada.
Manifestación en Murcia, en la Plaza del Cardenal Belluga. El movimiento ha logrado movilizar de nuevo a miles de personas a través de las redes sociales.
Manifestación en Pamplona por la puesta en libertad de la manada.
En Valencia, el movimiento feminista avisó de que tomaría las calles. Y así lo ha hecho.
La imagen ante los Juzgados de Bilbao ha sido también la de un clamor multitudinario
Women’s rights groups immediately took to social media to call for protests on Thursday night with the slogan: “If the pack hits the streets, we will as well.”
Around a thousand people marched in Pamplona, some shouting “Enough macho violence”, and there where also rallies in neighbouring Basque cities Bilbao, Vitoria and San Sebastian.
Hundreds also marched in Barcelona, some holding a banner that read: “In the face of patriarchal justice, feminist self-defence.”
“It is a shame, these scoundrel rapists get away so easily. It seems they want to release them so they are ready to start again on July 7, the day of San Fermin,” said 66-year-old protester Carmen Roman.
Another protest is scheduled to take place on Friday evening outside of the justice ministry in Madrid as well as in the southwestern city of Seville, the hometown of the five men, and other cities.
Demonstrators hit the streets of Pamplona, Spain.
Prosecutors had argued during the closed-door trial last year that the men’s victim was subjected to “serious intimidation and it prevented resistance or flight”.
They had asked for each of the men, who have been in custody since 2016, to be jailed for 22 years and 10 months.
One of the accused is a Guardia Civil policeman – currently suspended– and another was once in the army. Several are “ultras” who support FC Sevilla.
“¿Qué tiene que pasar para que se tomen en serio nuestras vidas?”
María Lozano
La manifestación ha comenzado frente al Ministerio de Justicia en torno a las 19.00 de este viernes. Ha continuado por la Gran Vía pasando por Cibeles, hasta llegar al Congreso de los Diputados, donde las asistentes han protagonizado una sentada multitudinaria en la que las mujeres iban perdiendo la voz, pero no la rabia.
Decenas de miles de personas han salido a las calles de nuevo para protestar contra la puesta en libertad bajo fianza de 6.000 euros de los cinco miembros de ‘La Manada’, que han salido este viernes de prisión. “¿Qué tiene que pasar para que se tomen en serio nuestras vidas?”, se preguntaban varias mujeres en la concentración de Madrid.Concentración en Madrid contra la puesta en libertad de los miembros de la manada.
“La rabia que tenemos es para cortar Madrid y todo el Estado”, denunciaba una de las personas presentes en la manifestación. La concentración ha comenzado frente al Ministerio de Justicia en torno a las 19.00 de la tarde de este viernes. Ha continuado por la Gran Vía, pasando por Cibeles, hasta llegar al Congreso de los Diputados, donde las asistentes han protagonizado una sentada multitudinaria en la que las mujeres iban perdiendo la voz, pero no la rabia.
“El feminismo está calando en la sociedad, desde abajo hacia arriba”, afirman desde el Movimento Feminista
Desde el Movimiento Feminista de Madrid han afirmado que esperaban esta respuesta ciudadana porque “el feminismo está calando en la sociedad, desde abajo hacia arriba”. Una de las representantes del movimiento ha afirmado a Público que “esto es una demostración clara de que la sociedad está cambiando y de que las leyes tienen que cambiar al ritmo que cambia la sociedad”. Además, advierten de que “si la Justicia no nos escucha saldremos a la calle hasta que lo haga porque de momento, la Justicia y la legislación no tienen una visión de género”.
“No hay palabras, esto una vergüenza”, ha denunciado una de las asistentes en la manifestación refiriéndose a la puesta en libertad de los miembros de ‘La Manada’. Ha afirmado que no le sorprendió la noticia de la liberación: “Después de que uno de los jueces considerara que era jolgorio y parecía que la víctima estaba pasándoselo bien, no me sorprendió nada que esto ocurriera”.
“¿Qué tiene que pasar para que se tomen en serio nuestras vidas?” y “¿Qué seguridad tenemos las mujeres en la calle?” han sido algunas de las preguntas que se hacían las asistentes en la concentración. “Estas personas son reincidentes. Lo han hecho más veces y además no lo reconocen y lo van a volver a hacer”, afirmaba una de ellas.
Uno de los hombres presentes en la manifestación ha denunciado que esto es una muestra de que “Franco sigue aquí en todos los niveles del Estado” y que “la Justicia lleva siendo patriarcal desde el principio de los tiempos y la transición es totalmente falsa”.
“Ella en casa y ellos de parranda”, proclaman los participantes, entre otros cánticos en los que expresan su rabia. “No valiente, quiero ser libre”, corean.
Protestas en toda España
Miles de mujeres se han concentrado en la plaza Sant Jaume de Barcelona, donde han usado cacerolas y llaves para hacer una protesta sonora. “Queremos justicia y no se ha hecho. Después de esto, ¿qué podemos esperar?”“Justicia patriarcal, sistema criminal”, dice una de las pancartas de las asistentes a la manifestación en Madrid.
Los convocantes de la movilización han subrayado que no se puede “permitir que los cinco violadores de ‘La Manada’ queden totalmente impunes”: “Queremos justicia y no se ha hecho. Después de esto, ¿qué podemos esperar?”, se han preguntado.
En Pamplona, donde se produjeron en los Sanfermines de 2016 los hechos por los que fueron condenados José Ángel Prenda, Jesús Escudero, Alfonso Jesús Cabezuelo, Antonio Manuel Guerrero y Ángel Boza Florido, se han congregado miles de personas en la plaza del Ayuntamiento.
“¡¡No es no. Justicia!!” es el lema de la pancarta que ha encabezado la protesta, que han portado mujeres con guantes rojos, color con el que desde hace años se simboliza el rechazo a las agresiones sexistas en Navarra.
Es el segundo día de protestas en Pamplona, después de que este jueves al poco de conocerse la decisión del tribunal se convocara de otra de forma espontánea.
En las capitales andaluzas los manifestantes, la mayoría mujeres, han sido miles. En la ciudad en que viven los miembros de ‘La Manada’, Sevilla, unas cinco mil personas se han concentrado en la Plaza Nueva bajo el lema “Si ‘La Manada’ sale a la calle, nosotras también”.
Un millar de personas se han manifestado en Granada ante el Tribunal Superior de Justicia de Andalucía, y otras ciudades como Jaén, Almería, Cádiz o Linares han protagonizado concentraciones.
En el País Vasco, miles de mujeres se han manifestado. En Bilbao se han exhibido carteles con frases como “sí es sí”, “no a la cultura de la violación”, “basta de justicia patriarcal” y “nosotras te creemos”.
Por su parte, en San Sebastián cientos de personas se han movilizado bajo la consigna “ante los ataques sexistas, solidaridad feminista. Ninguna agresión sexista sin respuesta” y han desplegado banderas moradas.
Mujeres y hombres de todas las edades se han congregado en Valencia frente a la Delegación del Gobierno para denunciar que “la justicia patriarcal es letal”.
En Castilla-La Mancha se ha exigido una justicia “más humana, sensible y formada en género”, mientras que en Asturias, centenares de personas han mostrado su solidaridad con la víctima a la que han recordado que no está sola: “Hermana, aquí está tu manada”.
Más de medio millar de personas ha salido a la calle en Santander, con cacerolas para mostrar su indignación y han pegado en la pared de la Delegación del Gobierno carteles con las siguientes proclamas: “Violar sale barato”, “violador, es tu momento, la justicia está de rebajas” y han puesto fotos de ‘La Manada’ junto al texto “soy un violador y el Estado me lo permite”.
Unas 1.300 personas han gritado en Logroño “No es no” frente al Palacio de Justicia, mientras que en Segovia unas 150 han reclamado que no se juegue con la seguridad de la víctima, al tiempo que han reclamado formación de género para los jueces.
Público
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Las concentraciones por toda España contra la puesta en libertad de los miembros de ‘la manada’
El feminismo ha vuelto a ocupar la calle para protestar contra “la justicia patriarcal” después de que la Audiencia de Navarra haya decidido no prolongar la prisión provisional a los cinco condenados
The case, known as the “wolf pack” trial because of the name the men used in their WhatsApp group, caused a national outcry after the defendants were acquitted of rape.
The case was widely seen as a cross-examination of the 18-year-old woman rather than the men who attacked her. The proceedings were criticised after the judges accepted into evidence a report compiled by a private detective hired by some of the defendants. The detective had followed the woman over several days and produced photographs of her smiling with friends.
This was used to suggest she had not suffered any lasting trauma, prompting hundreds of women to demonstrate outside court holding signs reading: “We believe you, sister.”
Defence lawyers claimed the woman had consented and had let one of the men kiss her. They also said that 96 seconds of video footage from the men’s phones – showing the woman immobile and with her eyes shut during the attack – constituted proof of consent.
The prosecution said the victim had been too terrified to move.Al final de la manifestación, decenas de manifestantes han protagonizado una sentada frente al Congreso de los Diputados en Madrid.
“The defendants want us to believe that on that night they met an 18-year-old girl, living a normal life, who, after 20 minutes of conversation with people she didn’t know, agreed to group sex involving every type of penetration, sometimes simultaneously, without using a condom,” the prosecutor Elena Sarasate said.
The verdict was criticised by many senior politicians, including Pedro Sánchez, the leader of Spain’s socialist party who recently became the prime minister.
“She said NO,” he wrote on Twitter at the time. “We believe you and we’ll keep believing you. If what the ‘wolfpack’ did wasn’t group violence against a defenceless woman, then what do we understand by rape?”
News of the men’s release prompted women’s groups to call protests in cities including Pamplona, Madrid, Zaragoza, San Sebastián and Barcelona on Thursday and Friday.
Laura Berro, the equality and LGBTI councillor at Pamplona’s city council, said the court’s latest verdict was proof of the patriarchal nature of justice.Cientos de personas se concentran en Madrid al grito de “Tranquila hermana, aquí está tu manada”.
“It’s shocking,” she tweeted. “But we will not shut up or be paralysed.”
Pakistani civil society activists light candles to pay tribute to late human rights activist Asma Jahangir in Karachi on February 12, 2018.
by Rabia Mehmood The funeral of Pakistan’s celebrated human rights defender Asma Jahangir was a poignant display of women’s resistance, writes Mehmood [Rabia Mehmood]
People don’t usually break societal barriers and disrupt the patriarchal order at funerals anywhere in the world, let alone in Pakistan. But on February 13, many women in Lahore, including myself, did just that by actively participating in a janaza, a Muslim funeral ritual, for the first time.
Fuck Abuse, Kill Power: Against the Root Causes of Sexual Harassment and Assault
The past year has seen a wave of revelations about powerful people—nearly all men—perpetrating sexual violence against those beneath them. The #MeToo moment has provided a platform for countless courageous survivors.
Yet although some men have been made to face consequences for the harm they have done, we are far from being able to solve the problem of male sexual violence. Focusing on the wrongdoings of specific men tends to exceptionalize them, as if their actions took place in a vacuum.
This is consistent with the mechanisms of a criminal justice system focused on individual guilt and a reformist politics premised on the idea that the existing government and market economy would serve us perfectly if only the right people were in power.
But with the bad behavior of so many men coming to light, we have to consider the possibility that these are not exceptions at all—that these attacks are the inevitable, systemic result of this social order. Is there a way to treat the cause as well as the symptoms?
Trigger warning for descriptions of sexual violence.
by MARIGREENDOGFor too long anarcha feminists have been labeled as the ladies auxiliary of male bomb throwers. The misconception and manipulation of both feminists and anarchist principles and practice have resulted in the use of sensationalist and ridiculing tactics by the state and its spokespeople.
This has not only polarised the general populace from potentially liberation concepts but has also polarised anarchist from feminists. In the past and more so recently there has been a uniting of these beliefs and Peggy Kornegger’s book; ‘Anarchism; the Feminist Connection’ goes so far as to say that the two genres of thought are inextricably tied although the connection has not been consciously articulated by feminists very often.
Kornegger argues that feminism “emphasis on the small group as a basic organisational unit, on the personal and political, on anti- authoritarianism and on spontaneous direct action was essentially anarchism.
I believe that this puts women in a unique position of being the bearers of a subsurface anarchist consciousness which if articulated and concretised can take us further than any previous group toward the achievement of total revolution.
While anarchism has provided a framework for the transformation required, for far too long even this revolutionary ideology has been largely male identified; male articulated, male targeted and male exclusive in both its language and participation.It has therefore been unfortunately lacking in vital analysis especially with regard to the psychological and physical realities of oppression experienced by the majority of the human population: women.Continue reading “Anarcha-Feminism.. by Flick Ruby..’real anarchists are always feminist’”
”Suggestions that I write my memoirs came to me when I had barely begun to live, and continued all through the years. But I never paid heed to the proposal. I was living my life intensely — what need to write about it?
Another reason for my reluctance was the conviction I entertained that one should write about one’s life only when one had ceased to stand in the very torrent of it. “When one has reached a good philosophic age,” I used to tell my friends, “capable of viewing the tragedies and comedies of life impersonally and detachedly — particularly one’s own life — one is likely to create an autobiography worth while.”
Still feeling adolescently young in spite of advancing years, I did not consider myself competent to undertake such a task. Moreover, I always lacked the necessary leisure for concentrated writing.
My enforced European inactivity left me enough time to read a great deal, including biographies and autobiographies. I discovered, much to my discomfiture, that old age, far from ripening wisdom and mellowness, is too often fraught with senility, narrowness, and petty rancour. I would not risk such a calamity, and I began to think seriously about writing my life. Continue reading “Emma Goldman’s ‘Living My Life’..read and download here”
Susan Abulhawais a Palestinian writer and the author of the international bestselling novel, Mornings in Jenin (Bloomsbury 2010). She is also the founder of Playgrounds for Palestine, an NGO for children.
by Susan Abulhawa from Al Jazeera with thanks When I was a little girl, like many women of my generation who grew up watching American television shows (even if they were dubbed in Arabic), I used to twirl and twirl, trying to attain super powers like Wonder Woman. I would twitch my nose to magically transform my surroundings, like Samantha from Bewitched.
These female characters were exceptions among the docile housewives, the efficient secretaries, and damsels in distress that pervaded the popular media of my time. Wonder Woman and Samantha had the power to change their lives, even if that power had to remain hidden, forever a secret.Continue reading “How Wonder Woman turned from a Hero to a War Crimes Supporter.”
But many people are still confused about anarchism, associating it with indiscriminate violence, chaos, and disorder. This distorted image runs counter to more than a century of anarchist activity in and outside the United States.
So if not chaos or disorder, what does anarchism stand for? What do anarchists believe in?
Core Anarchist Values
At the most basic level, anarchists believe in the equal value of all human beings. Anarchists also believe that hierarchical power relations are not only unjust, but corrupt those who have power and dehumanize those who don’t. Continue reading “Who are these Anarchists? and What the Hell do they Want?”
Feminism is not feminism if it is not antisexist, but also must be:
Antiracist (for wimmin of color)
Anticapitalist (for working class wimmin)
Female+Female love-positive (for lesbians and bisexual wimmin)
Anti-state (against the state control of wimmin’s autonomy, rejecting patriarchal protection rackets)
Anti-hierarchy (against wimmin exploiting other wimmin)
I can’t tell you how many wimmin have been turned away from anarchism — the politics of opposing all hierarchy — due to male violence, male abuse, male threats, male testerics. And that is an awful shame, because wimmin have the greatest chance for achieving anarchy.It’s pretty simple… Forget all your preconceptions about what anarchism is. Forget malestream anarchism with its male fantasies of “let’s kill all the bad people and we will win” because that’s just naive. Men are pretty dumb, let’s be honest. They expect everything to be cleaned up after them. Continue reading “Why you Can’t be a Feminist if you’re Not an Anarchist”
Everyday at lunch when it is nice out, I walk across the street to a little café and buy a bag of chips as a snack. And invariably I end up getting catcalled.
For me, the gauntlet of sexual harassment began early, as I developed beginning around 12, and until about 18 I looked much older than my years (one could say I eventually caught up). This gauntlet consisted of whistles, hoots, lewd comments, stalking as I walked home, groping, threatening comments if I didn’t respond – and many times there was some sort of combination.Continue reading “If Prostitution is Legalized…A Personal and Political View”
‘On August 6, Short’s planned moving day, she was found shot to death alongside her three children, her husband, and their dog in the family’s Pennsylvania home. A “murder/suicide note” was found “near one of the deceased adults,”
Megan Short, 33, posted a request to Facebook, asking for help moving on August 6. Only weeks earlier, she had commented under an article posted by a friend, saying she was leaving her husband.
The article, written by Leigh Stein, was titled, “He didn’t hit me. It was still abuse.” In it, Stein explained that, while working at a diner, her boyfriend made her shower twice a day, so she “wouldn’t smell like French fries after work” and so that she could shave her entire body, “or else he wouldn’t touch me.”
He also told Stein she “wasn’t sexy” and that, therefore, he needed to sleep with other women. Stein didn’t see her relationship as abusive, at the time, because her abuse was invisible — there were no bruises to prove it. “I didn’t know what to name what I couldn’t see,” she writes.
Like so many other women, Stein had learned that red flags were, in fact, “romance.” She writes, “I felt like I was in a movie — how quickly we moved in together and isolated ourselves from friends and family, because all we needed was each other.” Women are groomed to become victims of abuse, in this way. Continue reading “Abuse is not always ‘Visible’ as Megan Short was Punished by Death for Realizing”
Carrie Reichardt is a contemporary artist, who works from a mosaic-covered studio in London. A member of the Craftivism movement, she uses murals, ceramics, screen-printing and graphic design in her work. She is a dedicated advocate of the movement and curated one of the few exclusively Craftivist exhibitions in the UK. She talks about the ‘Disobedient Objects’ exhibition at the V&A, Angola 3 and much more!