Report-Back from International Women's Day Events across the U.S.

March 14, 2014 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

Across the country chapters of Stop Patriarchy, supporters of the Revolutionary Communist Party, chapters of World Can't Wait, and others answered the call to take to the streets on International Women's Day to express their outrage, to expose the whole war on women, and to bring alive a culture of defiance and liberation. These are the initial reports and photographs that we've received, with more to come.

New York City: "We have the moral high ground"

From Stop Patriarchy:

It was a righteous and spirited day of resistance against the war on women in NYC for International Women’s Day! Times Square did not know what what they were in for when we marched through. We left a major impact on many people, struggled with many people, and inspired many people. Thank you to all who spread the word and participated in this day of action. We need to continue to build off of this day; bring masses of people who have hungered for this into the movement, into the struggle, and into the understanding we have on what needs to be done to put an end to this war on women. 

Speech on International Women's Day on the Role of The Church in the War on Women

from a member of the Revolution Club:

We are here at St. Patrick’s Cathedral because the church is directly responsible for creating a culture in which women are shamed and demonized for having sex, for not wanting children, for being gay, bisexual, queer, and transgender, and for having abortions. This church in particular, and its very own Cardinal Timothy Dolan have spearheaded attacks against birth control. When birth control and abortion are not accessible, women’s lives are foreclosed, women are forced to stay in abusive relationships, and some women die. What is moral about any of this!? Do you think this is moral!?

When women are reduced to breeders, they are being told, that their lives count for nothing more than as a host for a fetus. We saw this in the recent case in Texas, in which a pregnant woman had a brutal accident, and died; she was brain dead. But her body was kept functioning to act as a literal incubator, against the will of her family, and the fetus was not even likely to survive.
Women are full human beings, fetuses are not! The church would like people to think that they are out to save babies. Some anti-abortion forces such as Operation Rescue, even say that abortion is the equivalent of a holocaust in this country. This is just bullshit! Fetuses are not babies! Women are not incubators! Abortion is not murder! This fight has never been about life, it has always been about control over women. Forced motherhood is a form of enslavement.

A lot of people in the '60s and '70s understood this deeply and were no longer going to accept a society in which women’s lives were determined by their reproduction. They fought to bring into being a society where women were viewed and treated as full human beings, and they made incredible gains, but ultimately they did not make a revolution, and so today we are facing the backlash; a push back to tradition.

41 years after Roe vs Wade and abortion has never been more stigmatized, more difficult to access, and more dangerous to provide. Whether you are down with revolution or not, you are here today because women’s lives matter, and none of these outrages that women face here and all around the world are necessary or acceptable. It doesn’t have to be this way!

We have the moral high ground! We are about the full liberation of women! And in order to women to be fully liberated we need abortion on demand and without apology! We need a society that does not legitimize an institution like the church that lies to, shames, and keeps ignorant so many people. We need to bring into being a culture that is about telling the truth. We are here today to be a part of making that real!

Los Angeles: "I am standing strong 4 others"

From a reader:

There is a war on women and abortion rights are in a state of emergency! There is a dire and urgent need to mobilize to protest across the country to protect women’s basic rights. We must turn the tide on abortion rights! 1 in 3 women have had an abortion, 5 states STILL only have one abortion provider hanging by a thread. In Mississippi, the Jackson Women’s Health Organization remains open until April 28, when there will be a trial held by the 9th Circuit Court that will determine the fate of the abortion clinic. The court hearing will be in the same court that allowed the closing of so many abortion clinics in Texas.

At the same time, 1 in 4 young women will be sexually assaulted in college before she graduates. The same rate occurs against women in this country’s military, 40% at the hands of her ranking officer. 1 in 5 will experience violence by her intimate partner before she graduates. 1 in 5 women will be raped in this country. One is too many! All this while pornography is intensified and the multi-billion dollar industry is fueling patriarchy and the dehumanization of women by men.

On Friday, March 7, the Revolution Club headed out to the corner of an intersection in a predominantly black neighborhood with banners that said “A Fetus Is NOT a Baby!” and “Abortion On Demand and Without Apology!” A woman walking by asked how we felt about murdering a baby. A volunteer responded, “A fetus is not a baby, abortion is not murder, and women are not incubators!”

A young teen walked by and took a flyer that announced plans to come out, stand up, speak out, and protest on International Women’s Day in front of strip joints and shops that sold items and clothing that reduced women to sexual objects for men’s titillation. She disclosed that she was also a victim. We asked if she would like to write something in chalk on the sidewalk. She wrote, “Due to rape I am standing strong 4 others”.

On Saturday, March 8, Stop Patriarchy and the Revolution Club headed out to the HER clinic, an abortion provider. We passed out stickers that read “Abortion On Demand and Without Apology”, “Create a World Without Rape!” and “Abortion Providers Are Heroes!” Across from our banners and bullhorns was a huge church. We yelled out “Not the church, not the state, WOMEN must decide their fate!”A couple of white men from the church came by our group to wave their rosaries, so we yelled back “Get your rosaries off my [her] ovaries!” We did not know what the two men hoped to do by waving their crosses at our faces, because we did not disappear nor did we back down.

On the way to Hollywood, volunteers from the Revolution Club boarded on the Metro and passed out palm cards that read “If you can’t imagine sex without porn, you’re fucked!” and “Abortion On Demand and Without Apology!” After each stop, volunteers headed out and boarded the next train to pass out more cards and announce what International Women’s Day was all about. In Hollywood, we chanted “It’s BULLSHIT! Get off it! Women are not for profit!” This chant broke open the atmosphere as onlookers stopped to watch activists unroll yellow tape that read “DANGER! CRIMES AGAINST WOMEN!” pulled across businesses like Playmates and Bizzy B, which sells sexy lingerie for women, and strip bars, which featured nude women for men’s pleasure. As we began rolling the crime tape back up, we realized that block after block, shop after shop, the Hollywood strip was lined with businesses that sold clothing for women to be men’s play-things and toys. We screamed, “NO MORE!”

On Sunday, March 9, Revolution Books hosted an International Women’s Day fundraising dinner for Stop Patriarchy. The store was filled with those who wished for a better world free of degradation and exploitation of women. Food was donated by an Iranian restaurant whose owner was enthusiastic about our event to bring in a radically different world. The program featured quotes by Bob Avakian, the Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, a March 8 letter by women from the Middle East about International Women’s Day, a presentation by someone who visited China during the Cultural Revolution (when women’s feet were unbound, women could divorce from their husbands, and women were free to walk the streets without fear of rape), a report-back about the events that unfolded during the weekend by a volunteer from Stop Patriarchy, and a video clip by Sunsara Taylor on plans for emergency actions to stop the war on women.

Chicago: Beginning impact, and the need for a leap

From a reader:

On International Women’s Day in Chicago, a group of some twenty people came together at noon to kick off the day’s protest by targeting the main Catholic cathedral in the city. The provocative yellow crime scene tape extended across a church building, proclaiming “DANGER: CRIMES AGAINST WOMEN.” The whole corner was decked out with eye-catching posters, stickers, and t-shirts demanding “Abortion on Demand and Without Apology,” “Fight for the Liberation of Women all over the World,” “Catholic Church Attacks Abortion and Birth Control,” “Forced Motherhood is Female Enslavement” and “Revolution, Nothing Less” as we challenged all the people passing by.

From a variety of different experiences and political points of view, all agreed to take to the streets this International Women’s Day to stop this war on women. Revolutionary communists were joined by a few younger people as well as older people who’d been part of the women’s movement and other progressive struggles in the 1960s. Half were women and half were men.
A person active in LGBT issues joined in the loud street agitation which exposed the wider war on women, including the Church’s role in abortion attacks—he, in particular, blasted the Church for its sexual abuse of children, which had happened to him and countless others.

A major local television outlet came out for a photo opportunity and a radio station conducted an interview with a spokesperson, with the protest as a backdrop.

Outside the cathedral, a reporter from a campus radio show interviewed people walking by to find out their reaction to this public scene, which he shared with us. Every woman who stopped to speak to this reporter poured forth personal experience of the oppression of women that had been meted out to her. For example, one young women movingly described, “A man in my life hits me. And then he tells me that it’s okay that he hits me because women have equality now and I find it VERY REPULSIVE!” Another women recounted how ever since high school, women’s rights and human rights have been important to her and how she speaks up every time against sexist jokes. “I am just not okay with all the bullshit!”

The protest then took off on a march for a couple of miles through some busy shopping areas of downtown Chicago, including stopping along the way to indict a fake abortion clinic that lies to women who show up looking for an abortion and manipulates them into foregoing the abortion. Along the march route, our chants rang out loud and clear and very unapologetically. All 500 leaflets, and many palm cards with the BAsics quote 3:22, went out, as we challenged everyone along the way. Many people connected with this, a good percentage in support and others wanting to know more, while the overall response was quite polarized. “Is it against sex trafficking?!” someone responded. A marcher who was signing people up on the clipboard to get connected with the movement to stop patriarchy said some people exclaimed, “I am so glad someone is doing something about this!” Others debated us, demanding to know, “So, people can get pregnant and just kill the babies?!” But his friends said, “I’m with you !” Some students lined up at the clipboard, eager to stay in touch.

A marcher noted that among many of the people that he spoke to who expressed real agreement that attacks on abortion must be opposed, they either did not grasp the urgency that abortion rights are in an utter emergency or else they recoiled from street protests, too stuck in “politics as usual.” We worked to draw the lines sharply with people who shouted out to us “I’m with you,” but then walked on by—“If you support abortion rights but are not out here acting in concert with others, these rights will be taken away from women!” One person handing out flyers reported that Black women seemed to be the most receptive, while some of the better-off white woman seemed to think they were “above it all,” dismissing it because “I already know all that!” In fact, many did not actually know about the situation with more Texas abortion clinics closing down this very week.

Someone handing out the palm cards noticed that, compared to past IWDs in this area of town, he was now encountering more outright opposition to abortion as morally undesirable. And some people did tell us outright that “you ought to be ashamed of yourselves,” calling us “whores” and “baby killers” creating a “holocaust,” even as our chants made clear—“Fetuses are not babies! Abortion is not Murder! Women are not Incubators!”

In taking to the streets on International Women's Day in Chicago, we had beginning impact and also learned how much a leap is urgently needed, where thousands and then millions of people step into this movement of resistance and bring forward a whole culture of defiance and liberation that sets society-wide terms and stops this war on women.

Seattle: Helping people find their voices

From a reader:

A committed group of people could not be stopped by the pouring rain and joined together to speak out with Stop Patriarchy on International Women's Day. We started by reading The Call to Action to End Pornography & Patriarchy mic-check style. This seemed to help new people find their voices. Activists and revolutionaries with Stop Patriarchy gave sharp agitation about the abortion rights emergency, pornography and prostitution, and why it will take a revolution to uproot patriarchy and liberate humanity. A young woman born in Somalia talked about the common practice of female genital cutting and mutilation, and said it needed to end now. When she was trying to decide whether to speak, she said she thought her nieces in Somalia would want her to. A Black woman riffed off of the Call to Action and cried out that she was tired of being degraded by men for being a woman, and by the police through police brutality. Another Black woman made the point that she supports Black men but is not willing to be exploited by them or treated like an object. A woman active in the environmental movement brought her two children and recited her favorite poem by Adrienne Rich, “Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers.” One of the most energetic speeches of the day was given by a male college student who got louder and angrier as he spoke out, ending with: “Women are not objects! Women are human beings! Women hold up half the sky!”

When a bunch of us went to a diner afterwards to get out of the rain and talk and eat, we talked about personal stories that some hadn't been ready to share on the mic. Thinking back on the speakout, what stood out most was the outrage and determination to stand up against the situation women face all over the planet, and to fight for the understanding that it cannot be justified and does NOT have to continue this way. We also observed that though we were small, the people who came out for the first time all had this in common: They had had some heavy, painful experiences that they were fed up about and they felt compelled to join up with others who were fighting back. We made plans to see each other again soon, the next day at the Revolution Books’ International Women’s Day Celebration and to build for the April 11 and 12 emergency actions for abortion rights called by Stop Patriarchy.

San Francisco: Stop the War on Women!

From Stop Patriarchy:

International Women’s Day march in San Francisco—from the anti-abortion, anti-gay halls of Saint Mary’s Cathedral, to the Archdiocese and the Vatican, to the Republican senators emboldened to call pregnant women “hosts” and say women who are pregnant from rape are lying… From the “religious freedom” that demands the “right” to discriminate against gay people in Arizona to the “religious freedom” criminalizing birth control and hunting gay people down in Uganda… From the religious fundamentalism that justifies murdering doctors to the religious fundamentalism that justifies veiling and acid attacks… From the sex trafficking flesh trade that ruins women’s lives and destroys their bodies, to a $12 billion industry of pornography that celebrates and feeds into rape culture, to the epidemic of rape and the overall commodification, dehumanization, violence and enslavement…

STOP THE WAR ON WOMEN!

Honolulu: International Women's Day March in Chinatown

From worldcantwait.org:

The sidewalks, clubs and art galleries in Chinatown are usually crowded on 1st Friday so World Can't Wait-Hawai`i put out a call for a march through the district to demand an end to the war on women. But this 1st Friday it rained! When organizers got to the spot where the march was to begin the sidewalks and galleries were largely deserted. Leafleters huddled beneath a gallery awning and began passing out the palm cards and leaflets from Stop Patriarchy, loudly announced that International Women's Day was the following day, and invited people to join a march beginning at 8. At the beginning it seemed the evening was doomed to failure but things quickly turned around once people began reading the signs and palm cards.

Almost the first person who took a palm card was a woman from Mongolia who enthusiastically said: "International Women's Day is really big in my country!" Another said: "I saw that International Women's Day was tomorrow on Google!" A woman from Tagikistan related how it was celebrated in her country. A tourist couple from Melbourne, Australia held signs. A Russian woman was eager to talk about events in the Ukraine.

 A man rushed up to the World Can't Wait-Hawai`i spokesperson saying "you would have loved the show on Olelo on "One Billion Rising." Then he looked at her and realized she'd narrated the show! ["Voices of Resistance"—an hour-long show on community television is produced by World Can't Wait-Hawai`i']. He went on to tell her that he had been moved to tears by the show, had watched it several times, and urged his friends who were with him to watch it as well.

A well-dressed older woman shared that she "can't believe we're still fighting for abortion rights" and then went on to share her outrage that the women's movement had largely backed off of "being radical."

Coming out in the rain had gotten a whole lot better. Most people took palm cards and thanked us. One couple initially passed by saying "I don't want one" and then quickly walked back to ask for one saying "I'm going to give this to my granddaughter."

At 8pm things were definitely looking up and an organizer turned on her bullhorn and called on people to pick up signs and begin marching. More than a dozen people headed through the district chanting and holding up signs for people in restaurants, galleries and clubs to see: A few people along the short route took signs and joined up. As the march went past popular clubs, young people standing outside snapped pictures. A few raised fists.

While the march wasn't as big as we had hoped, and we didn't reach as many people as we had hoped, when the march ended spirits were high. Pictures of signs and banners were taken to send to an International Women's Day march in Gaza. Marchers seemed reluctant to leave and instead took cover and continued conversations. It was hard to believe that only a short time before organizers had considered cancelling the march.

Cleveland: International Women’s Day marked

From a staff member at Revolution Books in Cleveland

We started the day protesting a "Crisis Pregnancy Center" that is located just a couple blocks from a major high school. Crisis Pregnancy Centers are FAKE clinics that provide no reproductive health care, no contraception, no abortion and no correct medical information.

There are more of these fake clinics around the country than REAL clinics that actually care for women! They are run by right-wing religious organizations made specifically to lure in women, and scare or shame them into not choosing abortion. In their mission statement, they say straight up that they are a “Christ-centered ministry dedicated to preserving life now and for eternity.” We protested to say NO to women getting tricked and lied to about abortion, forced or scared into motherhood. We had huge signs, including "Abortion on Demand and Without Apology!" along with enlargements of photos from Revolution newspaper on the liberation of women. Lots of cars drove by and people honked and waved their support. A few even stopped and got out of their cars to talk, including a high school teacher who got a copy of Revolution to take to his students.

It was a freezing cold and rainy afternoon and we then went to Revolution Books for a mid-day celebration with pizza, great music, and conversation. We watched Sunsara Taylor's International Women’s Day video message including her announcement of big plans for the Abortion Rights Emergency Actions April 11 & 12. People were pretty blown away by this! We then took turns reading aloud the statement from the Revolutionary Communist Party for International Women's Day.

By then we were warmed up and ready to face the cold. The whole group of us went to the site at 12205 Imperial Avenue in Cleveland, where in 2009 it was discovered that 11 Black women had been raped, murdered, and buried on the property. This was a truly horrible crime, which was made even worse by the fact that for years the Cleveland police shrugged off and even ridiculed various family members’ calls to them about their missing loved ones. The cops had insulted and humiliated family members, saying things like, "your daughter is a prostitute…your daughter is a crack whore." Each year on the anniversary of when the rapes and murders were discovered, people gather in memory of these women—and all victims of violence against women. And on this International Women’s Day, we gathered there again and erected a monument, made out of the powerful centerfold from the March 9 issue of Revolution, “Break the Chains! Unleash the Fury of Women as a Mighty Force for Revolution!" We declared our determination to fight for a world where such things DO NOT HAPPEN!

This March 8 ended with a really wonderful gathering. A local gallery brought together other store owners and residents in the area for a beautiful International Women's Day reception which included a Board member of Pre-Term, an important women’s clinic. Stop Patriarchy’s Call to Action and stickers were distributed, copies of the special issue of Revolution were taken up and appreciated by many.

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