Source: Women are Human
ES — Barcelona; FR — Paris. Last year, transgender activists in Spain and France made public calls for the murders of ‘TERFs’* and feminist activists, resulting in violence in Spain against women peacefully demonstrating for International Women’s Day 2020. For International Women’s Day 2021, transgender activists ratcheted up the violent action against women in both countries.
Spain
In Plaça Sant Jaume, Barcelona, women gathered for a protest on March 7, a day before International Women’s Day. In footage of the event captured on a cell phone camera, women are seen seated on the ground with protest signs laid around them. A banner visible on video shows the message, “Si no luchamos juntas, nos mataran por separado” (“If we don’t fight together, we will be killed separately”).
A group of trans activists can be seen suddenly kicking away and stomping on the women’s signs. The trans activists turn their destruction into dance moves and set it to the beat of music and a rhythmically clapping crowd.
One participant in the destruction, a large, tall man wearing a dark green dress and carrying a purse, appears to notice the cell phone camera trained on him as he punches the air in a violent dance. He walks up and seems to hits the woman’s phone before dancing away from the camera. He then picks up a protest banner from the ground and approaches the camera again while tearing up the sign. He seems to push the torn sign at the woman, reportedly hitting her and breaking the device. According to the woman, the police said they have not been able to locate the suspect.
An effigy made to look like a hanged woman was suspended from a tree in the area.
France
They started spray painting at the bottom of the statue “Save a trans person, kill a terf”
We were all shoked at the degree of violence we were going through. Our sisters at the top of statue (who are in majority prostitution survivors) were traumatized and some of them cried. pic.twitter.com/VeUpYR3HVH— narfem (@radfmnst) March 7, 2021
On the same date in France, the Collective for the Abolition of Pornography and Prostitution (CAP), a group of women who survived the sex industry, gathered at Place de la République, Paris. They were joined by L’Amazone, a group that includes immigrants and other marginalized women, and was created by FEMEN activist Marguerite Stern, who is also behind Collages Feminicides, a movement that has French women take to the streets to create canvas art to raise awareness that France has one of the highest rates of women murdered by intimate partners.
The French Government estimates 90% of the 20,000 to 40,000 women in France’s sex industry are victims of sex trafficking networks. Prostitution is legal in France, but the pimping and prostitution of minors is prohibited, and brothel-keeping was made illegal in 1946. While prostituted women are not criminalized, a law passed 13 April 2016 allows johns to be fined 1,500 Euros. Since the passage of the 2016 law, protests around the sex industry have gathered steam, with some demanding abolition of prostitution, and others demanding a reversal of the law.
On March 7 of this year, sex industry survivors from CAP climbed the statue with their purple and white balloons to display such abolition messages as “We want more means for women to get out of prostitution,” “Porn producers are pimps,” and “If your feminism profits pimps then it’s not feminism.” The rest of the women stood at the base of the statue.
In an interview with the podcast Women’s Voices, one of the women of L’Amazone said an individual came up some time later and tried to rip the women’s banners, screaming “Sex work is work!” The women managed to ward off the attack, but the individual returned with reinforcements.
By then, around ten of the women’s rights advocates had assembled more tightly together around the statue to protect the women at top, fearful they could be thrown off if anyone climbed up, the L’Amazone member said.
A crowd of youths in the 18-20 age range formed nearby, shouting at the women’s rights advocates on and around the statue: “No feminism without whores!” “Listen to whores!”
According to the L’Amazone member, a group of “men and trans women” purporting to advocate for transgender causes and against fascism and islamophobia announced their presence, yelling, “Paris Antifas!”
CAP and L’Amazone yelled back, “Male violence, MRAs!”
The pro-trans, Antifa organization screamed, “Transphobes!”
The L’Amazone member said a huge crowd began chanting over and over: “One TERF, one bullet – social justice.”
The crowd pelted the frightened women with eggs. A cell phone video shows trans activists throw an egg on a woman holding a sign that says “Vive le Sexe Féminin” (“Long Live the Female Sex”). The trans activists also attempted to spray red paint in women’s faces, witnesses said.
Video footage shows the crowd pushing and shoving the women, ripping up their signs and popping their balloons. The crowd attempted to push past the women standing around the monument, apparently to climb the statue where the sex industry survivors were. When blocked by the women at the base of the statue, the crowd spray-painted, “Save 1 Trans, Kill 1 TERF” at the base of the monument, witnesses said.
Today in Paris, the feminist group CAPP organized an action against prostitution. I joined it with my sisters from @l_amazone_. There were several prostitution survivor with us.
We were beaten up by queer activists who also threw eggs on our faces. pic.twitter.com/qs5w90Oxws— Marguerite Stern (@Margueritestern) March 7, 2021
The traumatized sex industry survivors at the top of the statue began crying, witnesses told News Week.
Another advocacy organization escorted the women’s rights advocates to safety.
The L’Amazone member told the interviewer that it later came to light that transgender activists had planned the assault on social media prior to the event, posting such messages as, “Be aware; there are going to be transphobic feminists, SWERFs, TERFs at the protest. If you see them, kick them out. Make them feel that they’re not welcome in our protest.”
She reported that she and some of the other women are shaken and suffering symptoms of PTSD following the experience.
Responding to the news of the day’s violence, a woman remarked on social media in Spanish, “Misogyny and power, new disguises. Same violence.”
