WORLD WORLDWIDE EUROPE SPAIN News Journal Update - (en) Spain, CNT (ICL-CIT) #435: We do not want the crumbs of the State - Laura L. Ruiz (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 I have nailed the phrase that a CNT Villaverde colleague said on one

occasion: «We don't give a shit about the glass ceilings, the women in
the IBEX, the percentage of female directives. We are with and for those
below at all». It is a statement that insistently comes to my head every
time the Day of Reconciliation, of Equal Salary, of Parity in
decision-making positions arrives. Every time the siren songs of the
Spanish or European reports try to tell us that things have improved.
But for whom has it improved? ---- Be careful, I do not want to say that
these mechanisms such as maternity/parental leave, Equality Plans or
Salary Records are not necessary. I say they are insufficient. When we
hear that the wage gap has been reduced from 30% to 28%, we seem to
forget that, at this rate, not even in 130 years would we have real
equality in wages. If from our union struggles we were told that with
the same professional category, a colleague is going to earn 30% more
than another with the same functions and hours, what would we do? To be
silent and to continue with the pit surely not.
The same happens with the double working day of women. There is talk of
work-life balance and co-responsibility measures -a very fashionable
word among Corporate Social Responsibility departments- but these rarely
have an effect on the life of María, a supermarket cashier or Marcela,
an assistant in a nursing home. These beautiful words remain in high
places, in large companies and in very specific positions. Nor does it
seem that the strategy of making housework or caregiving 'attractive' is
having much of an effect among colleagues. Very few go beyond
understanding that 'help' with homework is not needed, but rather that
they are their responsibilities too.

At this moment I also remember the phrase of a colleague from CNT
Miranda del Ebro: "All that they sell us every March 8 are crumbs from
the State." Of course, if when we hear that the average hours spent by
men in Spain on housework has increased from 31 to 37, we congratulate
ourselves, we are accommodating ourselves to the crumbs of the State.
And it is that while women dedicate two and up to three times more time
on average, we are not facing the social justice society that we so much
preach and aspire to achieve.

There is talk of reconciliation and co-responsibility measures, but
these rarely have an effect on the life of María, a supermarket cashier,
or Marcela, an assistant in a nursing home. These beautiful words remain
in high places, in large companies and in very specific positions.

We are staying with small advances, with the risk that we think that a
society where men and women have the same freedoms, the same weight in
society is not possible. It also happens to us when we face labor
conflicts. It seems that by achieving an unfair dismissal we have
achieved our objective when this should not even be to achieve zero, but
to get hold of the productive means and live in a horizontal society,
free of hierarchies.

anger and fear
When you think of the miseries of day to day, of the injustice of being
read as a woman in this patriarchal society and of its labor aspect, the
pointing finger of a CNT Córdoba colleague arrives. That finger points
in another direction, towards other women colleagues who do not always
come out in the focus of job insecurity. The temps. Women who not only
face instability and employer violations, but also sexual violence,
racism and xenophobia. To the most extreme poverty, to which not even
the crumbs of the State reach since this is another enemy. That the
Aliens Law must be added to all the patriarchal injustices only shows
that we cannot stop looking at the horizon because we resist believing
that this is the world in which we should live.
In the case of these women, the ones who pick the strawberries that we
eat on these dates, is an example that the personal and the work cannot
be separated. The structural, sexual or class violence that we receive
at work does not end when we sign up. The economic, emotional or sexist
violence that we receive at home accompanies us like a heavy backpack
when we go out looking for a job. And there arises anger and fear.

Fear of not finding a job and not being able to pay the bills. Rage for
having done 'everything' that society asked for: study, train, accept
worse jobs, trust in meritocracy. Fear of not knowing if we will see a
new day. Because we must not forget that most rapes and murders are not
committed by a stranger in an alley, but by an uncle, a husband or a
family friend. Anger because every time we denounce that they kill us,
the only reaction we receive are disqualifying or denial adjectives.
'Exaggerated', 'violence has no gender', 'false accusations'.

And while the morgues fill up.

This emergency should not make us minimize other forms of violence. From
the so-called micromachismos that disqualify new professionals, such as
the lack of value that work as vital as care obtains, such as the fact
that the most precarious sectors are mostly female, such as every time
unemployment increases or temporary contracts affect more women than
men. This reminded me of another colleague from CNT Compostela. The need
not to lose focus on our objective, but also not to leave day-to-day
battles in the hands of anyone other than ourselves.

universal violence
The complaints we make are neither new nor typical of our society. This
is how the Free Women who preside over the headquarters of the Anselmo
Lorenzo Foundation (FAL) or the colleagues from the textile sector in
Myanmar remind me of it. Our voice has always tried to be silenced and
steps have only been taken when we have organized ourselves. Together.
First to recognize the violence that crosses us. Because yes, just like
the most common gender violence, it can happen that you normalize the
situation and it's hard to realize that it's not your fault and it
doesn't have to be like that.

The suffering has been and is a lot to be calm that there is equality.
Equality of what? Of precariousness, poverty, lack of freedom to make
decisions.

No, it is not normal for men to earn more in the cleaning sector than
women. No, it is not normal that in sectors where activism is mostly
female, men are the spokespersons. No, it is not normal for the
participation of women in assemblies to be less than that of their male
counterparts. And yes, it is normal for these women to demand safe
spaces, even non-mixed ones, in the long march to conquer their rights.
Accompaniment, is the word that we should always tattoo when we ask
ourselves what we can do to help our racialized compañeras -and you are
not-, the compañeros survivors of macho violence -and you are not- or
the compañeras the 8M -and you are not a woman-.

Repression has always been in the feminist struggle as well. From
shaving the heads of the women who fought, castor oil or the wall, to
ostracism or paternalism today. We risk our lives. In some cases, like
the compañeras from Ciudad Juárez or Afghanistan, they literally take
their lives. In others, they take away the life we want to lead. By
attacking the right to abortion, the right to our sexual health, female
enjoyment, our gender identity. Also economic dependence, poverty or the
ability to enjoy maternity with the basic rights covered. Fear and
anger, again.

Feelings so universal that they have been the leitmotiv of feminism in
all the waves that we can count today. The discrepancies, which may be
in the solutions, sometimes cloud a truth: the goal is always a fair
world free of violence for everyone. Not just equality. That falls short
for us. The suffering has been and is a lot to be calm that there is
equality. Equality of what? Of precariousness, poverty, lack of freedom
to make decisions. No. We do not want the crumbs of the State or the
system. We want it all.

https://www.cnt.es/noticias/no-queremos-las-migajas-del-estado/
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