Women of Latin America Protest Against Gender Violence
Before celebrating the Women’s March in the United States, let’s talk about women’s solidarity in Mexico and Argentina.
In 2016, thousands of Latin American women came out of the shadows and in to the streets to protest against the gender based violence suffer in those countries. Thousands of women from Mexico to Argentina joined to protest against the gender based violence that women under go in some of these Latin American countries.
Latin American is widely known for many things such as its beautiful sceneries, its catchy music, and its delicious food. Unfortunately, Latin America is also known for its high percentages of cases of gender based violence and for the machismo or male chauvinism that its present in most of Latin American cultures. Today, Latin America has one of the highest rates of gender based violence, and women are the most frequent victims of this type of violence. Gender base violence persists in Latin American countries due to the cultural norms about gender which establishes a power imbalance between women and men. In some Latin American cultures, the power leans towards the men due to machismo or male chauvinism, which is a belief that men have an extreme amount of power over women because they have superior abilities and intelligence that women don’t have. This machista belief causes many types of violence that are mainly directed towards women because they are seen as inferior, not worthy to have any type of respect. In addition, they use male chauvinism to strip women of their fundamental right given to them by the different Latin American constitutions and allow the continuation of gender based violence towards women by using machismo to justify the injustices done to women.
Black Wednesday: Argentinian Women Against Gender Based Violence
One of the major protests against gender based violence took place in Argentina on October 19, 2016. Large amounts of women “took to the streets in cities across Argentina on Wednesday” to join on a national protest against gender based violence towards women, after the dreadful rape and murder of an Argentinian teenage girl in the coastal city of Mar del Plata. Lucia Perez was a 16-year-old teenage girl who was taken to a local hospital after being drugged, brutally raped, and murdered. Two men, who are the presumed offenders, took her to the hospital claiming she had an overdose; however, the doctors confirmed that she suffered from a cardiac arrest due to the torture she underwent.
Lucia’s horrific death prompted activists all around Argentina to make October 19 Black Friday a day in which they protested against violence towards women. Eighty cities of Argentina made part of this protest. Every woman was encouraged to any type of work for an hour and join the marches that demanded for ‘no more machista violence.’ The pouring rain and the intense wind didn’t stop the Argentinian women from coming out to the streets with their all black clothing, and initiating the Black Friday. Thousands of women joined the march top protest against the violence against women in the country, which is a problem so common in Argentina, for “every 30 hours in Argentina a woman is killed” in such hate crimes against women.
“Government statistics show that crimes against women have risen 78% since 2008 in Argentina…”
These women were marching to have their voice heard by the government and have them realize that the legislation passed to try to encompass violence against women isn’t enough, for “femicide,” the murder of a women by men on account to their gender, continues to be part the top cause of death of many Argentinian women. These women ask for the end of machista violence against women.
#NiUnaMenos/ #NotOneLess
Not all women were able to attend to the marches across Argentina, but they showed their solidarity through social media using the hashtags #BlackWednesday and #NiUnaMenos/NotOneLess which means that not one woman would be lost to machista violence. This hashtag is now being use by women around the world to express their solidary and desires to eliminate the gender based violence towards women. On Twitter, the hashtag #NiUnaMenos has been use to post pictures of the cumulative protests that are happening around the world. Women are not afraid anymore and they are protesting for a better future for themselves and for their daughter.Purple/Violet takes the streets of Mexico
Just like in Argentina, on April 23 of 2016, thousands of women across Mexico came out to protest against the “epidemic of violence against women.” More than 40 cities form part of the organized protest against gender based violence towards women done across Mexico. The protest was organized entirely by women from all over Mexico and not one of the organizers declare herself the leader of the movement. Activist encourage women and men across the country to object to the violence against women by joining what they declared the Violet or Purple Spring.
“We’re sick of suffering all kinds of abuse when we just walk in the street,” said Mari, a protester.
The marches across Mexico demanded the end to all forms of gender based violence and unfair treatment towards women, but the major marches across Mexico were mainly focused on bringing attention to street harassment, rape, and femicide. Nationwide, it is estimate that about 44,000 women have been killed over the last three decades and the rates of femicide are 15 times higher in some regions than the international average.. According to the data from the government’s official statistics agency, the perpetrators of these femicides are mostly friends or family member of the victims. The official statistics from the federal government also suggest that that 60% of Mexican women over the age of 15 have underwent some type of abuse, from verbal harassment up to sexual violence. Women are also victims of streets harassment and it is belief that the Mexico City subway was ranked the second most dangerous transit system, for 64% of the 380 women surveyed declared having me groped or harassed on the public transport.
#VivasNos Queremos & #MiPrimerAcaso
Just like the Argentinian women, Mexican women used social media to express their solidarity with their fight against gender base violence. However, Mexican women mainly used social media to tell their stories, for the first time, about any abuse they had experience throughout their lives. Women used mainly the hashtags #VivasNosQueremos (‘we want us alive’) and #MiPrimerAcoso(‘my first harassment”) to give their “testimonies of their first encounter with sexist violence.” The hashtags inspired and gave courage to many women to openly and for the first time in years talk about their personal encounters with gender based violence. Thousands of stories were share; Melanie Robles Obregon’s story was one of those. Melanie Robles told her story of how she first encounter sexist abuse in elementary school. She expresses how she was afraid “all the time, to the point that remembering it now in therapy makes [her] sick and angry.” She also talked about how she told her parents how her “cousin molested [her] all the time;” however, her parents didn’t believe her. Melanie expresses hoe she felt “ashamed and afraid when [she] talked about it” because her parents lived under the machista belief that men shouldn’t be blame or sexist assault like this one. Women are thought to be the devilish beings that provoke them to commit gender based crimes towards women. Testimonies like that of Melanie Robles serve to show that there is a continuous violence towards women not just nationwide but worldwide, and that Latin America continues to have the false believe that machismo is correct.
“Thousands of us spoke from our heart and made public what we have been silencing, or what has been ignored and not heard before….”
Women are finally coming out to march and protest against gender based violence. Women have kept quiet for many years and now they are fighting. They are fighting against rape, femicide, harassment, domestic violence, but they are fighting against the belief that men are superior. They would not be stopped until something is done to change the way women are treated not only in Latin America, but in the world.
“Violence against women devastates people’s lives, fragments communities, and prevents countries from developing,” said Noeleen Heyzer, executive director of the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM)
Women would not be oppressed.
