The 8M in Barcelona will have a unitary demonstration. Also in a bulk of Catalan and Spanish cities. In Madrid, however, the divisions that in recent years have stressed the feminist movement on account of the trans law, prostitution or the ‘law of yes is yes’ will be staged again with two different marches On the one hand, the demonstration called for years by the 8M Commission, to which hundreds of entities and unions adhere. On the other, the self-proclaimed Feminist Movement of Madridwhose objective is to request the abolition of prostitution and show their opposition to the trans law and the policies of the Minister of Equality, Irene Montero. The apparent schism is not unrelated to the struggle between the PSOE and Unidas Podemos for waving the feminist flag.
In fact, feminism is a plural movement and stressed from the beginning: the white suffragettes, for example, did not allow the women to parade with them. black women, and in the 1970s and 1980s, lesbian and black activist collectives also launched a strong amendment to the then feminist agenda. However, there is no doubt that the debates within the movement – between a more traditional and trans-exclusionary current and a younger, transversal and popular current – have become more visible with the explosion in favor of equality in recent years. And even more so in Spain, where the coalition government He has held openly opposed positions on sensitive issues.
disagreements
Montero has promoted the ‘yes is yes’ law, the trans law and the abortion reform. All of them have generated Tensions within the Executive and have left open debates around the prostitution, the rights of trans people and punitiveness against rapists. The PSOE, for its part, has promoted a law abolitionist of prostitution, which does not have the approval of Podemos and which, for the moment, sleeps in a drawer in Congress, given the political and judicial earthquake that has caused the entry into force of the ‘law yes is yes’. There are already more than 700 reductions in sentences for rapists.
To try to correct this “undesired effect”, the socialists have presented a legal retouching that the purples reject because, in their opinion, it means dividing the crimes again based on whether there was violence, leaving consent aside. In addition, the PSOE, taking into account the demands of classical feminism, tried to limit the possibility that the minors They can change their sex, through the trans law, without judicial endorsement, but their proposal declined due to lack of support.
echo in motion
All these clashes are having a big echo in the feminist movement to the point that a federation has emerged that raises its own agenda and criticizes Montero, who hardly has strength in other territories, but in Madrid. She calls her own march because “Podemos has colonized” the traditional demonstration with “interests other than women’s rights” and “she may be tempted to use 8M to validate her legislative bungling“, according to Lola Venegas, one of the spokespersons for the Madrid Feminist Movement. This federation defends the abolition of prostitution and pornography.
“We may be tempted to use 8M to validate their legislative bungling”
Lola Venegas
But his biggest criticism has to do with the trans lawwhich is already in force and allows the change of sex in the ID with the mere will of the interested party, without demonstrating two years of hormonal therapy and a medical report. In the opinion of the feminist sector opposed to Montero, who drinks from the international opposition to queer or transfeminist theories, the movement “has never claimed that men can call themselves women” and “substituting gender identity for sex is reactionary and misogynistic.” It can “erase women”, they maintain.
Does it hurt feminism?
Important socialists, such as carmen bald, align with this thought. However, overall this sector disagrees with the actions of the PSOE for not having stopped the trans law or the ‘law yes is yes’. “They have ignored the alerts,” laments Venegas.
For her part, Patricia Aranguren, a member of the historic 8M Commission, sees it as “logical” that there should be a differentiated demonstration, consistent with the one organized last year, and does not consider that these tensions “harm” the movement because the split is from a “small” group. The Commission is not opposed to prostitution because there are abolitionists and regulationists within it, but it has promoted trans rights.
The feminist philosopher Silvia L. Gil nor does it consider that thedivision” in feminism can “stop” a revolution that is questioning “everything”, from “inequality in care to the naturalness with which sexual violence is assumed or how gender is constructed”. This professor also points out that the women’s movement”has always been plural” and the current divisions in Spain respond to “political interests”.
“The danger is not feminist debates, but conservative resistance”
Silvia L. Gil, philosopher
Watch out for resistors
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For the author ofhorizons of feminism‘, more important than the “debates” around the issues on which there is no consensus, the real danger to equality is the “resistors conservatives”. “I think the focus should be on criticizing those who resist to advances and not to those who promote them. The conflict is not created by feminists, but by an unequal society […] This is precisely why we need movements capable of generate complicity from differences“, he reflects.
“The divisions have made the movement weaker now,” maintains communication expert Verónica Fumanal
However, another specialist, the expert in communication and leadership Veronica Fumanalhe does consider that “the radicalization of some positions”, spurred by the “power struggle” between the PSOE and Unidas Podemos, “They have divided the movement and that makes it weaker.” “Divide and conquer,” he recalls. And he predicts that, as the elections approach, “the differences will be exacerbated to mark the profile.”