Global Women's Strike Calls Women to Shannon Airport on 8th March!

by Ray Fri Jan 31, 2003 10:43

THE 4TH GLOBAL WOMEN'S STRIKE - A CALL TO ACTION FOR 8 MARCH 2003
by Global Women's Strike - Global Women's Strike Fri, Jan 31 2003, 9:24am
phone: Irl 087 7838688 or 091 520269 [email protected]
WOMEN SAY NO WARS. INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING!
WE INVITE YOU TO TAKE ACTION ON INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY 2003 WITH WOMEN FROM MANY COUNTRIES. We all know that it has never been so urgent to stop the world and change it. We live in terror that the US government will use its weapons of mass destruction, unleashing who knows what violence on people and environment. At the same time, media censorship can't hide an unfolding anti-war movement of millions, South and North, including in the US itself, a movement increasingly not only against war in Iraq, but against all wars. It's not as though we've been living in peace. Behind every headline are women fighting for the life of communities traumatised by terror and destruction.

THE 4TH GLOBAL WOMEN'S STRIKE
A CALL TO ACTION FOR 8 MARCH 2003
WOMEN SAY NO WAR!
INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING!

WE INVITE YOU TO TAKE ACTION ON INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY 2003 WITH WOMEN FROM MANY COUNTRIES.
We all know that it has never been so urgent to stop the world and change it.
We live in terror that the US government will use its weapons of mass destruction,
unleashing who knows what violence on people and environment. At the same time, media censorship
can't hide an unfolding anti-war movement of millions, South and North, including in the US itself,
a movement increasingly not only against war in Iraq, but against all wars. It's not as though
we've been living in peace. For millions of us, economic plunder has been enforced by military
genocide - from Congo to Kashmir, Palestine to Colombia, Chechnya to Sudan, Yugoslavia to Afghanistan.
Behind every headline are women fighting for the life of communities traumatised by terror and destruction.

As deadly as weapons is the starvation millions of us face. On top of food
scarcity imposed by killing economic priorities, are floods and drought
imposed by climate change. Women work endlessly trying to feed families
enough to survive for another day. For carers, organising for survival is
inseparable from organising for change. But our survival is not an economic
priority, so our survival work is invisible and uncounted.

Every 8th March, Strike actions in over 60 countries on every continent
broadcast our demands, which are rooted in our international experience.
The more we as women come together to break the divisions of race,
ethnicity, nation, religion, language - which divide us to deprive us - the
more grassroots women's needs are visible and our demands heard against the
wars and the trade in arms that soak up our resources.

Over half of world military spending is by the US. It is this military
might that enforces US economic supremacy. It imposes oil - the prime
pollutant - as the main energy source. With its European and Israeli
allies, the US promotes and sells weapons to governments everywhere to make
war with each other and to defend their power against us. That's how 75% of the budget of,
for example, Uganda and Pakistan is devoured by
military spending.

The Strike's demands are addressed to all governments:

* Payment for all caring work - in wages, pensions, land & other resources.
What is more valuable than raising children & caring for others? Invest in
life & welfare, not military budgets & prisons.
* Pay equity for all, women & men, in the global market.
* Food security for breastfeeding mothers, paid maternity leave and
breastfeeding breaks. Stop penalising us for being women.
* Don't pay 'third world debt'. Women owe nothing, they owe us.
* Accessible clean water, healthcare, housing, transport, literacy.
* Non-polluting energy & technology which shortens the hours we work. We
all need cookers, fridges, washing machines, computers, & time off!
* Protection & asylum from all violence & persecution, including by family
members & people in positions of authority.
* Freedom of movement. Capital travels freely, why not people?

In recent months, the Strike's key demand for the return of military budgets
has been echoed by all kinds of people in Third World and industrial
countries. They have agreed that even the threat of war is an attack on
every life on this planet: from mothers demanding clean accessible water,
food and welfare, to veterans among millions of others in dire need of
health care, to waged workers forced out of work without means of survival
or struggling against low pay and long hours, to people with disabilities
and pensioners deprived of a dignified income, to children denied basic
education and students denied grants, to homeless people . . . All point to
the $900+ billions world spending on weapons of mass destruction and demand
to know: WHY MUST THE MILITARY BE THE PRIORITY FOR WHICH
EACH OF US MUST DO WITHOUT?

This is a new and holistic protest, against not only war but the draining of
our collective wealth and resources for war. The consensus global priority
is to reclaim the military budget. To this end, people are working out new
ways of organising based on each sector being accountable to other sectors,
and rejecting political ambition and parties whose priority is their own
power. Though men may be the most prominent, women are always the
backbone of anti-war activism.

Throughout the year, the Strike has done many kinds of organising: weekly
anti-war pickets in a number of countries, and daily work to defend our
right to welfare, healthcare, asylum from deportation, rape and other
violence . . . Our JOURNAL and ANTI-WAR PETITION have gathered
momentum for 8th March by carrying news of Strike activities in many
countries. The Journal is now in Spanish, English, Swahili and Portuguese, and
the INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING international petition is also in many
languages.

The Strike network has also taken part in a number of important
international events.

VENEZUELA In July, at the invitation of the government's Women's
Institute, we sent a sister from Guyana, one from Peru and one from the US.

Having voted in President Hugo Chavez to head their movement, Venezuelans
began to reclaim their oil revenue to eliminate the poverty of 80% of the
population. They soon faced a military coup, engineered by the US and the
racist Venezuelan elite that had been electorally overthrown after over 40
years in power. But hundreds of thousands of grassroots people - led by
women who risked their lives first - came into the streets and defeated the
coup. Now their government, acting on the growing conviction that none of
us can win without international support, was calling women activists to
build an international network of solidarity.

The Strike is telling the story of women and this 21st century revolution -
the story that is never told about revolutions - and acting in its defence.
Venezuelans, and above all grassroots women, are forming their own
organizations to replace the traditional political parties based on
corporate interests, personal ambition and corruption. We are spreading the
news that CNN and Fox hide about what we are winning in Venezuela against
overwork and poverty, which is a lever for everyone.

(See http://womenstrike8m.server101.com/English/venezuelan_revolution.htm)

ARGENTINA IMF/World Bank policies of privatisation and corruption have
reduced half the population to poverty. In August, five sisters from Santa
Fe attended the Social Forum in Buenos Aires, spreading the news of how
women in some of the poorest neighbourhoods have formed assemblies to
organise communal food, win emergency benefits and challenge corruption in
the distribution of subsidies. They made valuable contacts for the Strike
in the exploding Latin American movement for change.

TANZANIA Three sisters from England joined a sister from Uganda at a
conference of breastfeeding advocates and Unicef in September. We went to
continue to defend mothers and infants from manufactured formula that kills
at least 1.5 million infants a year, mainly in Third World countries - truly
a weapon of mass destruction.

But we found that, like the rest of the UN, Unicef is now part of the global
market, working with McDonald's and Coca-Cola, and corrupting NGOs with
funding and careers to support its genocide.* It is itself distributing
formula, using HIV/AIDS as the excuse. We raised the desperate, crucial
need for food security for nursing mothers. It was a subject the conference
refused to discuss. And local African mothers, who know best and should
have been central to these discussions, were absent.

UGANDA We then travelled to meet the Kaabong Women's Organisation. Our
sisters there are forced to work desperately hard as global warming brings
drought, which leaves them always on the edge of starvation. They walk
miles to dig for water that is not even safe. They build the houses, grow
what food they can and prepare it, care for children ... Every year they
walk three days without food to be part of the Strike and let the world know
that they are organising for change: to clean the water, to plant an
orchard, to build their women's centre, to demand more than bare survival
and endless work. Some men support this organising; they know the
community's survival depends on it.

BOLIVIA In November, Aymara sisters from Peru carried the Strike demands
when they joined with Quechua women to mark the day of non-violence against
women.

BRAZIL A sister from England and one from the US attended a conference,
also in November, to help plan a march against US domination from the World
Summit in Porto Alegre to Caracas, Venezuela.

Our network of struggles is stronger and extends further, connecting us with
what women are making happen all over the world. Women in Nigeria joined
across tribal affiliation and occupied the offices of Shell Oil, which had
exploited, corrupted, polluted, killed and maimed for profit. They demanded
some of these lavish profits for food, schools, healthcare - for caring.
Such struggles for survival and change are points of reference for the rest
of us, enabling us to see our own pain in the experience of others, but also
to find our own power in the victories of others. To gain independence, we
have often had to "prove ourselves": to suppress our needs, adopt macho
values, work harder than men, play down our unwaged caring work, spend less
time with our children and families, and even look down on our mothers
(while "professionals" look down on us). With the Global Women's Strike we
bring women's priority of Invest in Caring Not Killing to every initiative
for change.

Striking to reclaim the world military budget for caring is a strategy that
could only come from women the carers but, like caring itself, is central to
everyone's survival: so social wealth is invested in caring, not in killing;
so life and the care of it once more becomes society's priority, and the
work women do to protect life is finally recognised as the basic work of
society, to be shared by all; and so we stop the oil for war and war for oil
that makes war on all of us every day.

Power to the sisters against war. Stop the world and change it!

Selma James
24 January 2003

*Our book The Milk of Human Kindness: Defending breastfeeding from the
global market and the AIDS industry (S Francis, S James, P Jones
Schellenberg and N Lopez-Jones; Crossroads Books, London 2002) counts the
vital work mothers do providing breast milk, exposing how humanity's basic
food is under attack. Before this, the Strike had worked with the World
Alliance for Breastfeeding Action, which had invited us to the conference.
But, funded by Unicef, it refused to dissociate itself from this genocidal
policy.
________________________________________________________________________

TAKING ACTION

The 8th of March is around the corner and organizing is happening in many
places. Anyone can be part of the Global Women's Strike, on your own or
with others, taking whatever time off you can, organising an activity or
bringing your present activities into the Strike. Here are some ideas of
how to use the Strike to strengthen and extend what you are already doing or
to start a new initiative:

* Publicize the Strike demands at meetings. Ask your group or trade union
to endorse or pass a resolution of support and to make a financial donation.
· Give prominence to women's anti-war demands with the INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING Petition.
Gather signatures wherever you go, and give it to others.
* Distribute the Strike JOURNAL - it has news and photos of last year's
Strike.
* Leaflet neighbours and family, at school, college, community group,
nursery, laundry, shopping centre, hospital, doctor's surgery . . .
* Use the letter in support of women in Venezuela - spread the news of what
we are winning there. It will add power to everything else we do.
* Attend Strike meetings if you live near a Strike group, or form your own -
we'll be glad to help you to do this.
* Take the Strike to the media. Write or call your local press, TV and
radio station to tell them why you support it and what activities you're
planning.
* Mount an exhibition of the work that women do and highlight our
contribution to the anti-war, anti-poverty and human rights movements.
* Make a Strike banner to take to pickets and demonstrations, and to go
petitioning.
* Tell men that their support is welcome and that Payday men's network is
coordinating men's support internationally.

The Journal and website will give you ideas of what other women have done:

Putting a broom outside the front door, taking an extended lunch break,
asking local churches to ring their bells for women, marching through the
village, town or city centre, congregating at a significant location,
holding a picket or a speakout, having a Strike video show, presenting
grievances and demands to politicians . . .

In some countries, where International Women's Day is officially celebrated,
women have been able to get schools and local government to publicly
recognize women's contributions and support the Strike demands.

Don't forget to send us your news and views, photos, poems, art work, so we
can post them on the website and put people in touch with you. If you speak
more than one language, please help with translation. And let us know if
you have a new email address.

INTERNATIONAL CO-ORDINATION:
International Wages for Housework Campaign
WinWages (Women's International Network for Wages for Caring Work)
Women of Colour WinWages
230A Kentish Town Road, London NW5 2AB, England
Tel: +44-20-7482 2496 Fax: +44-20-7219 4761
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://womenstrike8m.server101.com

Co-ordination of men's support:
Payday - a network of men Contact London address. E-mail:
[email protected]

NATIONAL CO-ORDINATION:

ARGENTINA
Sindicato de Amas de Casa
Francia 3036, 3000 Santa Fe
Tel: +54-342-453 0216 and 496 0868
E-mail: [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

ENGLAND - see international co-ordination

GUYANA
Red Thread
72 Princess & Adelaide Streets, Charlestown, Georgetown
Tel/Fax: +592-227 7010
E-mail: [email protected]

INDIA
Chhattisgarh Women's Organisation
Pithora, Mahasamund, Chhattisgarh 493551
Tel: +91-7707 71107
E-mail: [email protected]

IRELAND
Wages for Housework Campaign
10 Galway Bay Apartments, Salthill, Galway
Tel: +353-91 520269
E-mail: [email protected]

PERU
Centro de Capacitación para Trabajadoras del Hogar; Grupo de Mujeres
Diversas
132 Wakulski, Cercado, Lima
Tel: +51-1-423 1958
E-mail: [email protected]
Centro Cultural Aymará 'Pacha Aru'
Jr. 20 de Julio No 159, Urbanización Fernando Belaunde Terry, Chanuchanu,
Puno
Tel: +51-54-356 808
E-mail: [email protected]

SPAIN
Mujeres por un Salario para el Trabajo Sin Sueldo
Centro 'Las Mujeres Cuentan', Radas 27 Local, 08004 Barcelona
Tel/Fax: +34-93-442 2304
E-mail: [email protected]

TRINIDAD & TOBAGO
National Union of Domestic Employees
Mount Pleasant Rd, Arima
Tel: +1-868-667 5247
E-mail: [email protected]

UGANDA
Kaabong Women's Group
PO Box 9344, Kampala
Tel: +256-41 271012, Fax: +256-41 346456
E-mail: [email protected]

USA
Wages for Housework Campaign
Women of Color WinWages
Los Angeles Crossroads Women's Center
PO Box 86681, LA, CA 90086-0681
Tel/Fax: +1-323-292 7405
E-mail: [email protected]

Philadelphia Crossroads Women's Center
PO Box 11795, Philadelphia, PA 19101
Tel: +1-215-848 1120 Fax: +1-215-848 1130
E-mail: [email protected]

San Francisco Crossroads Women's Center
PO Box 14512, SF, CA 94114
Tel/Fax: +1-415-626 4114
E-mail: [email protected]

related link: womenstrike8m.server101.com

by Millie Tant Fri Jan 31, 2003 11:29

Phallocrats keep away.

by el Cid Fri Jan 31, 2003 11:35

Why didn't you post a link & summary?

Why didn't you ask the ballbusters to do so?