Not One More (Ni Una Más)

Yesterday there was another protest in Madrid. They've become quite common lately, despite the new law trying to limit their number and intensity. But this one was very numerous. People from all over the country attended, travelling in chartered buses and private cars. Over twenty thousand arrived to join local protestors. There are no official numbers on the total of protestors, but by the time the protest reached its final stop in Plaza de España, people stretched out all along the route it had followed from its beginning in Plaza de Atocha, quite a long walk. In Spain the different demands have different colors. Protests about education are green, protests about health care are white. Yesterday's protest was purple, against gender violence, aggressions against women. 

The objective of the protest was to awaken the public from its lethargy by pointing out that violence against women is growing again in Spain. And this government, unlike the last that passed laws protecting women from their aggressors, is taking funding away from the different public and private associations that help battered women. The judge in Vigo who is in charge of gender violence wants another judge to help her out and more police officers keeping women under surveillance to make sure they're safe from their abusers. The regional government, however, says the judge has enough help and doesn't need any more. That, even though the police syndicate complains that each officer has between eighty and a hundred women each to look out for, instead of the maximum twenty the regulations recommend. That, despite the five women murdered in the Vigo area this year alone. 

I found a blog (in Spanish) where there is a list of women killed each year since 2007. This year so far there are forty-eight. There was a black day, October 17th, in which four women were murdered in different parts of Spain; Valencia, Bizkaia, Murcia, and Pontevedra. One of the men had a restraining order, but if there are no police officers to enforce it, what does it matter? Each murder listed is explained. Some are not counted by the government as gender violence, either because they didn't occur in Spain or because the murderer was not the partner of the victim. The author includes them, though, because they are still violence against women by men within the context of a relationship. For example, he includes the sister whom the brother-in-law killed when he killed his wife, and the friend who died when she accompanied the ex-girlfriend to pick up her belongings at the ex-boyfriend's apartment. Of course, if the government does not consider these women victims of gender violence, their families get no compensation. And the government spends less.

There are detractors, of course. A small far-right political party, Vox, unfurled their own banner at the beginning of the protest yesterday, claiming violence has no gender. They also cried out, "Feminazi!" when the first manifesto was read, demanding the government reinstall funding helping battered women and that sexual aggression be included as gender violence. The police quickly ordered them to disband and leave. Fortunately, they did. And there was also a lopsided political representation. The leaders of the left of center political parties, Podemos, PSOE, and Izquierda Unida were at the head of the protest, including the leftist mayors of Madrid and Barcelona. But the right of center parties, PP, UPyD, and Ciudadanos, only sent low-level representatives. Not much else to be expected from politicians that defend "traditional values."

The differentiation of the sexes begins in childhood, where boys are given trucks and tractors to play with and girls are given dolls and tea sets. Things have been changing, but so slowly, as in "and the ice age slowly melted away." Each year we say the next generation will be better than this one, and each year it's the young adults that indulge in gender violence and the general demeaning of women. It doesn't say much about how we educate our children. My husband has a three-year-old nephew, and from the beginning "boy" toys were what he was given and encouraged to play with. And so it continues, generation after generation. Someday, perhaps, women will achieve equality and respect as women, but I don't think I'll ever see it.