Police clash with women’s day marchers in Turkey (VIDEO)
UPDATED 9th March..
Using rubber bullets and tear gas, Turkish police have dispersed a crowd of several thousand marchers who gathered outside Istanbul’s Taksim Square on International Women’s Day, local media reported, with videos from the scene.
The “Feminist Night March” in Istanbul was one of the many demonstrations held on Friday across Turkey, demanding equality and an end to the historic oppression of women.
Police has started intervention with rubber bullets & tear gas against 17th Feminist Night March on Istanbul’s Istiklal Avenue on International Women’s Day.
via/@medyanhaberpic.twitter.com/bmM6Riku28
UPDATE: The call for a feminist General Strike, at work and at home is spreading around the world and extending for more days. Reports are appearing of extensive organising, especially in Spain, Italy, Rojava and Brazil.
Again this year it will be the minority CNT and CGT anarcho-syndicalist trade unions who call the Feminist General Strike on 8th March International Women Workers Day in Spain. This strike registration gives the huge popular ‘Work and Home’ feminist strike some legal protection against continuous State attacks.
The National Confederation of Labor, in response to the call of the feminist movement and in accordance with the principles of the organization, will convene on March 8 a feminist general strike of 24 hours in all sectors, so that anyone from any part of the territory will have all the legal guarantees to support the strike.
The Spanish Stateis a land where the feminist fight stands strong. on January 15 there were protests of women in many cities for two reasons: 1) supporting their Andalucian sisters on the inauguration of the new right wing government of Vox-PP-Ciudadanos, and 2) uniting forces towards the 8M strike. Though the main unions (CCOO, UGT, USO) called for partial strikes, others (CGT, CNT) called for a general strike. Meaning, the movement broadens.
Almost a year after the historic 8M strike of 2018 that mobilized millions of people in defense of women’s rights, the reasons that motivated that call remain fully valid.
Women continue to face day after day a capitalist and patriarchal society that denies them the most basic right to non-discrimination.
The violence that is exerted on women, at home, in the street or at work, must be attacked and annulled by society as a whole to aspire to live in a more just and egalitarian environment.
As a union, CNT faces every day the labor discrimination suffered by women only because they are so. Neither the current legislation nor the courts protect the right of women to work on equal terms with their male colleagues.
Abusive agreements, lack of effective tools to guarantee the same salary for performances of equal value, unrecognized illnesses characteristic of work in feminized sectors, harassment and sexual abuse, are just some examples of the conditions that women live in their work environment.
Faced with this reality, CNT will summon the entire working class to a feminist general strike on March 8 to demand the elimination of the wage gap, both direct and indirect, the elimination of obstacles in access and promotion in employment (sticky soil). and glass ceiling), measures that facilitate the reconciliation of work and family life from co-responsibility, eliminate the reform of the pension law in
which only 23% of women will retire at 65, as well as the end of all discrimination at work at the service of the family home.
Like last year, CNT is positioned behind the feminist movement and, along with other social groups and organizations, will continue working to achieve a true political and social change where care is recognized, valued and shared.
Because all oppression will find the CNT in front, the 8M will go out to join our strength and contribute to the success of the call.
Permanent Secretariat of the Confederal Committee
CNT convocará huelga general feminista de 24 horas el 8 de marzo
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”
The court of ‘La Manada’ did not believe a woman who reported that her partner raped her Spanish / English
He got just 10 months, though even the Defence asked for 2 years, for beating and stabbing her. But they acquitted him for rape because she ‘didn’t struggle enough’. This despite the fact that the prosecution requested ten years in prison and had a previous conviction for raping another woman.
Journalists from around the world have been reporting on these large-scale women’s rights rallies, which have taken place almost every month since May. Chartered buses transport women from towns and cities all over the southern half of the Korean peninsula to attend. Continue reading “How Radical-Feminist Koreans confront Misogyny”
We have received copies from WordPress.com of Court Orders granted to Turkey to order them to ban this blog thefreeonline in Turkey and for internet users ”originating on Turkey”and also around 50 more blogs for posts against fascism, racism and patriarchy by the ‘elected dictator’ Erdogan and in favour or Democratic Confederalism. ( see list below, includes Latuff Cartoons, Desert Peace, Uprooted Palestinians, etc).
thefreeonline is a modest blog which promotes a utopian novel called The Free and posts relevant news, etc, in this case about the inspiring bottom up democratic revolution in Rojava, which has been brutally repressed in Turkey itself and now in Afrin with the Turkish invasion.You can’t read thefreeonline anymore in Turkey (except with a Vpn or Tor) , or if you’re a person ”originating in Turkey” (we’re not sure how that works, but the order seems to aim at blogs translating or sharing news from exiled Turkish people and supporters..
The ban includes the suppression of much more frequented sites, see list below, and probably there are many more, and perhaps Google and other blog hosts have followed wordpress’s example of refusing to appeal the banning orders.
WordPress’s statement says ”we must comply to keep WordPress.com accessible for everyone in Turkey. We will not be challenging this order in court”. In other words Erdogan is blackmailing again, threatening to ban all WordPress.com blogs from Turkey (as they did before) unless those critical of him are suppressed.
To help, complain or comment to wordpress.com they give this email> Support<legal@wordpress.com>
We could fill pages with a list of documented blackmail scams by Erdogan over the years, one of his most disgusting being extracting billions of euros in EU tax money in exchange for blocking refugee boats. This while exploiting the same refugees as illegal semi slave labour and recruiting them as jihadi mercenaries to invade and ”ethnically cleanse” (a euphemism for genocide) Rojava and now parts of Northern Iraq. see.. Erdoğan threatens the world with exporting jihadist terrorists ..
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.”
In Kenya, women protested in a restaurant where a waitress had asked a woman to go to the restrooms to breastfeed her baby.In Chile, a communications agency aired a TV message that highlighted the fact that no law protects breastfeeding women, nor do they have any legal recourse if they were harassed while breastfeeding. Continue reading “From Kenya to Chile: Fighting for the Right to Breastfeed in Public”
Officers seized the pills and attempted to remove one woman who openly took a tablet which was delivered to protestors by a tiny robot controlled from the Netherlands to circumvent the country’s laws.