On November 25, 1999, the UN established the “International Day against Violence against Women” to commemorate the story of the three Mirabel sisters, Dominican activists who were barbarously killed on November 25, 1960 by the agents of the dictator Trujillo while visiting their husbands in prison. For the courage to oppose the dictatorship and fight for rights by paying with their lives, they inspired writers and directors to go down in history under the name of Las Mariposas (The Butterflies).
Despite numerous initiatives and awareness campaigns against violence against women, this sad phenomenon continues to reap victims, especially in the home, where the worst cruelties are not unknown, but boyfriends, husbands and cohabitants. This tragic chronicle has not stopped even in recent months, on the contrary, during the lockdown many women, due to the limitations of freedom imposed by the restrictive Covid ordinances, found themselves, without escape, even more isolated and at the mercy of violent cohabitants.
Finding themselves inside the house of their persecutor, however, is inevitable for many women also due to the lack of economic autonomy.
Unfortunately, in Italy, the positions held by women in work environments such as business are still very low. For the same job, the salary is much lower than that of a male colleague.
So maybe we need to start thinking about fighting from here. Starting with how we conceive of Women every day. Starting from culture.
Books are “tools” that guide people’s sentimental education and guide them in the transition from drives to the ability to know through their own feelings. Gender equality should already be taught to children in kindergarten.
Today I feel close to all women.
Gender-based violence is the explosion of a social symptom of inequality and the will to prevail. It is a dynamic of possession that has nothing to do with love but hate.
I want to dedicate to all Women these wonderful words of William Shakespeare to caress the soul of every woman abused, used, humiliated by those who should have loved and protected them, because I believe that the word is the first weapon to tell, to denounce and to start living again.
For all the violence consumed on her,
for all the humiliation he has suffered,
for his body that you have exploited,
for his intelligence that you trampled on,
for the ignorance in which you left her,
for the freedom you have denied her,
for the mouth you plugged her,
for the wings you cut her,
for all this:
stand up, Gentlemen, in front of a Woman.
And if that were not enough, bow down every time she looks at your soul,
because you can see it,
because you know how to make her sing.
Stand up, Gentlemen, every time she caresses your hand,
every time he dries your tears like you were his children,
and when he is waiting for you, even if you would like to run.
Standing, always standing, my Lords,
when he enters the room and plays love
and when he hides the pain and loneliness from you
and the terrible need to be loved.
Do not try to reach out your hand to help her when she collapses under the weight of the world
It does not need your compassion.
She needs you to sit on the ground near her
and that you wait for the heart to calm the beat, for the fear to disappear,
that the whole world will start to turn again quietly.
And it will always be you who will be the first to get up
and to give you a hand to pull you up so you can get closer to the sky,
in that high sky where his soul lives
and from where,
Gentlemen,
you will never tear it
