An Emotional Day to Remember and Celebrate the Growing Movement to Stop the Violence Against Women

As part of International Women’s Day, Bay Area groups turned out to remember the systemic violence against women and celebrate resistance to it.  The gathering took place at the Comfort Women memorial.   Rev. Deborah Lee (Women for Genuine Security) and Corrina Gould (Indian People Organizing for Change) led the ceremony.  Members of local organizations created exhibits for this event to honor and discuss the many issues affecting women around the world.

• WWII comfort women
• Missing and murdered indigenous women
• Women victims of war
• Migrant women at the US-Mexico Border
• Women impacted by US military bases in Asia and the Pacific
• Palestinian women living under Israeli occupation
• Incarcerated women

The groups that attended the event included: 

Women for Genuine Security with Chinese Progressive Association, CodePink San Francisco, Comfort Women Justice Coalition, Eclipse Rising, Indian People Organizing for Change, Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity, National Lawyers Guild/SF Bay Area, Nikkei Resisters, One Heart for Justice, and Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom EAST BAY and SF.

Organizers stressed the  need to recognize women’s dignity and integrity, and to condemn systemic violence against women, as steps toward changing official policies that condone or promote it. This ceremony showed broad community support for eradicating sexual violence as a matter of urgency.