Day for the right to live without fear
November 25 has been the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women for 23 years. This year the focus is on the demonstrators in Iran. Commentators also draw attention to violence against women in the family, at work and in cyberspace.
Cyberbullying as another form of violence
Eldiario.es stresses the need to help victims of cyberviolence:
“Another form of violence against women has emerged in recent years, cyberbullying. ... The damage is not limited to abusive posts - the way the victim's social environment reacts also has consequences. ... The message causes primary victimisation, the lack of support causes secondary victimisation. ... What happens in the work environment? ... If it decides not to protect the woman, it tries to shift the responsibility onto the victim. ... These are (sexist) strategies aimed at trivialising sexist aggression. ... Institutions and companies should take action and counter both the violence and misogynist indifference.”
Skewed understanding of roles is the problem
What is needed is a whole new understanding of violence against women, Der Tagesspiegel demands:
“When a woman is killed, which happened 113 times in Germany last year, the terms 'relationship dramas' and 'acts of jealousy' are often used. But this not only trivialises the crimes that involve murder and manslaughter, it also fails to recognise the problem that causes them. In our supposedly enlightened and increasingly equal society, a distorted understanding of roles is still widespread. According to this view a man is allowed to exercise power over a woman. Patriarchal attitudes of entitlement towards a woman are apparently not the exception.”
New struggles against oppression
Evrensel reminds readers that 25 November was chosen as a day of remembrance because in 1960 the dissident Mirabal sisters were killed by the henchmen of dictator Rafael Trujillo in the Dominican Republic on that date. Today, the centre of women's protest is Iran, the newspaper notes:
“Amini's assassination led to the beginning of a new struggle against the dictatorship in Iran, which started with women and spread in waves across the entire country. The fearless Iranian women have taken the path of struggle and fought without fear of death and murder. ... In our country, too, there is a tenacious and determined struggle by women who take to the streets against the oppression and terror of one-man rule and voice their demands for equality and freedom.”