MARCH 8, 1908 - FIRST DAY OF THE WOMAN

“Jesus, Mary Joseph!” exclaimed Police Officer Flannery.

“I ain’t never seen thousands of dames on the streets,” yelled another policeman.

“This ain’t County Down or a village in Poland or Sicily. These dames are on the streets of New York."

Fifty thousand working women and housewives had taken to the streets of New York.

There was rage and impotence and despair. It was molded and sculpted in each and every face. These were women who each day screamed and wept in silence, poor and rich alike. Trapped in male chauvinistic/sadistic notions, in hypocrisy, drudgery and slavery.

Sultry Italians from Sicily, Calabria and Naples. Dusky Jewesses from Poland and Russia. Red haired Irish and Welsh women. Blonde Poles and Ukrainians. Some carried placards on one hand and held on to their children on the other. Others yelled and screamed their rights, which heretofore had been rigorously denied them. Still others walked grimly with infants suckling at their breasts. These women could not live their lives in femininity.

So long as they trudged and drudged on and survived 85 hour work weeks, YES! Week after week, seven days a week they could dedicate what was left of their time and their lives to their families. Tuberculosis stalked them. Malnutrition was ever present. Accidents in the work place were an everyday occurrence. Their male employers did not care.

“There are thousands more waiting in line to take their place,” they reasoned.

It was common for the pretty girls to be raped by their managers and employers. Most girls and women fully expected to be raped or assaulted. Sometimes the horror of the abuse rendered the women depressed. Somehow most overcame these continuous sexual and physical assaults. Whenever possible, they passed off the child as their husbands. One in a while a women would feel so strongly about carrying a child of rape that she would risk it all and go to an abortionist.

The chemicals they used on the textiles burned their hands and arms. It gave them chronic asthma and bronchitis. The bitter cold (for the factories did not have any heating, what for? Workers are not human anyway) gifted them with pleurisy and galloping pneumonia.

"Desist! Stop this! We have had enough!" Decided the women.

“We want better working conditions for all working women.”

“First of all, we are not sexual toys. “

“We say No to Rape.”

“No more slaving for 85 hours a week and receiving wages for 10.”

“We ask for our rights to be recognized.”

“Our working hours must be paid.”

“We need at least two weeks leave after childbirth.”

“So many of us are bleeding to death by returning to work the day after childbirth.”

But where were the fathers, husbands, brothers, and boyfriends of these warrior women?

In cemeteries, in coalmines, in shipyards, in hospitals, insane asylums. Some dragged their poor pain-wracked bodies to bars and drank themselves to death.

On that historic day, March 8, 1908, no one in authority in the city of New York dared to stop or interfere in any way with the MARCH OF THE WOMEN.

Most probably the element of surprise caught them off guard. Let us also consider the possibility that they did not take the women seriously. Someone at Tammany Hall, perhaps a lover? A relative? Thought women needed to let off steam once in a while. After all, their lives centered on unceasing work in the work place, more work in the house, chores to do in the market, church on Sundays if their Bosses allowed it and twenty hours or so allotted to bring forth a child into their anguished life.

By the time the Dominators and the Alpha Males reacted it was too late. Thousands of women, richly dressed, swathed in sables; poorly dressed, covered in patched clothing and raggedy coats, had reached Fifth Avenue. One of the Vanderbilt women who was marching alongside an anarchist Italian called Nuse from the hypotenuse in triangle yelled out to one of the policemen on horseback who was doing his best (and failing) to turn back the tide of women.

“Damn it Officer. Don’t you dare hurt any of us. There’s rich and poor in here and there will be hell to pay if female blood flows that is not menstrual.”

This marked the first organized demonstration by women and for women to stand up for their inalienable rights. It is a memorable date. This year marks the centenary of that first demonstration and uprising by our fellow Sisters.

The whole world will commemorate this day. Women like us will ensure that our sons and daughters will continue the struggle. We have won only piddling battles. We are not yet Victors. We have yet to win the War.

For More Photos of this strike, I recommend going to: http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/trianglefire/photos/photo_display.html?sec_id=8

VIVA LE DONNE: HURRAH FOR WOMEN

Success! In 1975 the United Nations General Assembly voted to make March 8 the International Day of the Woman throughout the world. I am saddened by the fact that not many people in the US are familiar with it. In my family we commemorate this day instead of the vulgar and tacky Mother’s day. It is also less "Hallmark"ed.

Pope John Paul ll mentioned the tragedy and the inalienable right to dignity and respect towards all women. You can all read it in his Apostolic Letter “Mulieris Dignitatem.” It has been translated into over a hundred languages.

In Italy, the land of Beauty nonpareil, the elegant and chic Italians created the most charming and moving tradition. The yellow mimosa is given to all women on this day. It is abundant this time of year in the Italian and French Riviera.

I have a dazzling mimosa tree in my garden. It’s fragile appearance represents Woman. Its faintly sweet and erotic scent our fecundity and the sturdy tree the symbol of Life and Death.

To all you women out there, friends, blood kin and those I have yet to meet and regrettably might never meet – I wish you with all my passion a beautiful Day of the Woman.

THE INTERNATIONAL DAY OF THE WOMAN

VIVA LE DONNE. MUCHA FUERZA A LA MUJER.

In years past, the celebrations throughout Europe for the International Day of the Woman used to be memorable events. Like the Pied Piper of Hamelin, I led thousands of women in song and in dance on Piazza della Signoria in Florence, directly facing Palazzo Vecchio where Cosimo de Medici Dux, Pater Patriae - Father of his country ran his financial, trading, banking and political empires.

When I moved to Palazzo del Drago in Via della Quattro Fontane in Rome which is just around the corner from the Quirinale, the Presidential Palace, Sandro Pertini, Italy's President joined the march for several blocks and hugged and kissed many of us. At the time Pertini and I had been involved in a playful and flirtatious relationship devoid of sex.

As a woman I called the shots.Even in permissive and sophisticated Europe any relationship that reeked of sexual hanky panky with a man like Pertini who was a sort of latter day Diogenes would have been a dumb move on my part.He also had a feminist wife a la Hillary. True to form she had him watched and her jealous scenes were foaming at the mouth ones. They reminded me of the stuff of wanna be Greek tragedies.

Today there was no one on the streets of the Italian Riviera with sprigs yet alone masses of mimosa to share with other women.Sometimes men bought huge branches of mimosa to gift the women in his family. That too has changed with global warming or is it cooling?

Many women were just too knackered to participate or even organize a joyous march. Lest we forget, the world is going through a terrifying Depression. It hasn't hit the Riviera badly but people and especially women can feel its trickle down effects from other areas of Italy such as Rome and from countries like England, where thousands of young Italians owned small businesses or worked in the City of London that was, or are still employed as engineers and skilled workers in refineries.

As usual, the brunt of the economic blow has fallen on the seemingly frail but steely shoulders of Italian, German, Belgian,Dutch and all the rest of the valiant women around our poor planet.

In Italy, the men have been laid off. Their salaries cost more than the women's ever did. One important point the so called wacko - fanatico - lesbo fringe of the Feminist movement lost ignominiously. Equal pay for both sexes. Never did happen. Now? Quien Sabe? Who knows?

The hapless hubbies stay at home and watch Sky, play Lotto or watch porno babes on the boob tube. Their worn-out women are under paid and over-worked in the work place as well as in the home. They know it, we are all aware of it; the corporations and the government. Mum's the word. I know a woman whose son happens to be a genius. Her husband is a drunkard and can't hold a job or a piece of string together. She works as a cleaning woman in a High rise corporate building from 10:00 to 1:00 in the morning. She has a day job as a cleaner/minder from 9:00 to 7:00 in the evening. In her North African country she was a successful lawyer. She married a handsome Italian who had a good paying position with a shipping company. And then Disaster struck. The Italian government did not recognize her legal and juridical deegree. She was taking special classes to change that status. The shipping company has pirates in the Horn of Africa to fight, plus the Depression which has reduced Commerce. Hence, middle level individuals had to go. Guess who does the groceries, cooks, cleans, washes and irons in that household?

In the meantime lesbian radicals are fighting for the right to have lesbian sex explained to 7 year olds in public schools. That is really the worst timing I have witnessed so far this 2009.

"Hey man haters, at this moment we have more urgent issues on the plate to take care of. Let's talk food, decent housing and jobs."

Rapes committed on adolescent girls and boys are increasing exponentially all over the E. U.
I will not discuss America, Africa, Asia and in particular East Asia as that will form part of another blog I am creating. Desperate parents are selling children as slaves. Adoption agencies close both their eyes and wealthy would be parents tell themselves they would make better parents because they have more money and can provide better education, health care, love and attention.

The number of fouled up rich families are legion, I know many of them well." Never mind. here's the money give me the honey." ( the children)

Chalk that up to more failures on the part of the feminists.

Let's look at relationships and marriages. In my clan in the Philippines, the men looked after their women, they cherished them. Those who wished a career in Music, Law or Medicine were free to pursue their dreams. The money they earned was theirs to do with as they pleased. The man was the breadwinner and the Provider. The woman was the Loving center of his and his family's universe.Most marriages proved to be imperfect. The men and women thrashed out a modus vivendi as cordially and as warmly as possible. Sometimes they yelled and ranted and raved. They didn't have to make sense. They were Austro-Hungarian Italians and Castilians with Chinese and Filipino blood thrown in! They made it work. Their extended families made sure of that.

Where have all the extended families gone? Batty Auntie Betty has been packed off to the nursing home. Feeble -minded Uncle Freddie idem. Wise grandparents, great - uncles, aunts, cousins, have all but disappeared. At Happy Holiday time, in some countries you are not allowed to utter the word Christmas, these abandoned, shunted, neglected, mostly forgotten relatives find their homes, apartments, trailers, and rooms Hallmarked to the ceiling with Happy Holiday paper.

One talented and creative oldster Ranieri, makes decoupage out of all the Hallmark cards he receives. He earns about 20,000 Euros a year for his designs. Add to that his 24,00o Euro state pension as a former engineering mechanic. He lives in a sort of solitary yet splendid ambience with two royal Burmese cats and a Siberian Husky. He is a volunteer teacher for a non-profit vocational school which gives him an enormous satisfaction.

His daughters migrated to Switzerland to do their feminist thing ( hairdressing). They have several abortions and two live children between them. He does not plan on leaving a single cent to what used to be his family long ago.

On this day of the Woman I must say with sadness and regret that the Feminist Movement hindered and devastated women culturally,morally, spiritually and emotionally. Betty Friedan was no Rosa Luxembourg. Rosa died fighting for the true empowerment of women - to vote, to receive equal pay in the workplace, to be individuals not objects of sexual desire - unless a woman chose to become one, to work in a safe environment. to obtain a divorce from physically or emotionally abusive spouses.

Betty Friedan was a mentally disturbed woman albeit a genius, according to her family. The world is crawling with mad geniuses. I read her book"The Feminine Mystique" in the early 70's.
It frightened me because it was a dangerous book based on Marxist Leninist principles published in so called America, which was, I thought a Republic.Flawed but full of republican principles. I suspected she may have been a rabid Communist. The kind who would stick you in a gulag for offenses against the feminine mystique and let you rot there till you went bonkers or were suicided.

Rosa Luxembourg was a Socialist Marxist. She said so in all her political rallies. I consider her misguided but let's just say that her heart and intellect was in the right place. But Rosa was moved not only by the plight of women, she realized that men had to be liberated as well. Her agenda was not to destroy the family. She was passionately in love with her lover Klaus Knecht. He was brutally murdered along with her by thugs of the extreme right during the horrific German Depression brought on by the excessive demands and needless humiliations heaped upon Germany by the victors, America and Britain after World War l.

As I ponder on this portentous day which no one but the Catholic Church and some Christian Woman's groups and an association of prostitutes are commemorating, I can see Women are yet again receiving the sharp end of the bayonet in these hard times. Nothing new there. It has always been thus.

I had a series of talks with Simona X. Head of the Prostitutes Association of Genoa. She would like prostitution to be recognized as a profession. That is part and parcel of male hypocrisy to pretend it is some sort of evil calling. Like it or not, prostitution is a profession. That means that the women will pay taxes. That should be welcomed by the Janian( as in Janus the two-faced God of the Romans) Finanze - the equivalent of the IRS. The average salary of an independent woman who works on the streets is about 5 to 10,000 (ten thousand) Euros a month. I am using the word independent with deliberation. These women do NOT have pimps. They are on their feet and backs 6 to 8 hours a day. As Melina Mercouri in the famous motion picture "Never on Sunday," Sundays are a No, No, to these women too.

The housewives who engage in prostitution from their homes or from posh apartments near their homes make as much as 5,000 to 10,000 Euros a night. They too would like some form of taxation, protection and recognition, such as retirement benefits and Social Security. Many are married. Are their partners complicit? What do you think?

"Times are difficult. We have seen a reduction of our once-in-a-while-fuck-flings. Our regulars don't frequent us as often , but we still manage to make good money," Simona told me.

You must all be dying to know why I have engaged Simona the prostitute in a cordial dialogue. I have been requested by Simona to teach the girls and the women English.

'' We all need to consider other part time employment that will eventually turn into full time. In this manner we can retire and make way for the new wave of young prostitutes. Therefore English is a must."

By the way, they are the only Women's group that will hold a silent candlelight vigil on Via Maddalena, their street and place of employment, and enjoyment to countless men. It is the Montmarte of Italy.

It is clear to me that the New Man and Woman has much to learn and unlearn.

God bless Women. All Women. May they grow and endure.

To see my 3 posts from last year too ... just look at the labels on the left side of this post and select "International Women's Day".

THE HOLOCAUST AT THE TRIANGLE SHIRTWAIST FACTORY IN NEW YORK

Inspired by the Women’s March, which took place on the 8th, Carmela, her sister and Mesta, a fifteen year old Polish communist led a sit down strike in solidarity with the marching women. Mesta’s name was an acronym. M stood for Marx. E was for Engels. S – Stalin. T for Trotsky and A for her grandfather who was one of the most daring Anarchist agitators in Warsaw – Aronovitch. Thus - Mesta.

The Triangle Shrtwaist factory was one of the most infamous places to work in New York. Therefore one should not be surprised to learn that it was also a protest against their intolerable working conditions.

The strike dragged on for days. The women had brought meager provisions, which they shared among themselves. Nothing their vicious employer did could force them out of the Cotton factory. They were impervious to threats.

‘All you c---s are all fired unless you walk out this instant,” shouted a frustrated and furious Mr. Johnson. The BOSS.

“Basta!” they shouted back. Nothing and no one could and would move these women to end their strike.

Fiends under orders from ? The heinous Johnson perhaps? We use the word perhaps because no inquiries, investigations or inquiries were ever conducted. I repeat, fiends/monsters blocked all the exits of the factory by placing heavy metal boxes down the stairs and against the doors to prevent the women from escaping the holocaust that had been decreed for them.

Fire broke out at about 4:30p.m. at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company trapping young, immigrant workers behind locked doors. Many jumped to their deaths or were burned beyond recognition. The 18-minute fire left 146 dead

That was a holocaust. I challenge anyone to tell me otherwise.

The youngest to be consumed was twelve years old. She was Carmela, a Sicilian girl. Her five cousins all in their early teens and her 18 year old sister all burnt to nothing.

They all died unimaginably horrible deaths. According to Rosa Luxemburg in Germany who wrote endless articles and pamphlets about the martyrs in New York’s garment district, many of the women formed a huge circle when they realized the smoke would kill them and embraced each other. They were told to scream because the smoke would sear their lungs faster and their suffering would end.

To remember the tragedy Rosa Luxemburg proclaimed the day March 8, as the International Day of the Woman.

Who was Rosa Luxemburg? She was a brilliant, charismatic intellectual and militant. An anarchist genius, who was one of the founders of the German Communist Party. Her work “The Acquisition of Wealth“ is a masterpiece. I don’t agree with all of her actions and thoughts, but as Voltaire often wrote and declared “I will defend her right to say them.”

We owe much to Rosa Luxemburg for keeping the story of this holocaust alive. Rosa unlike Betty Friedan, did not hate men. Indeed she had tempestuous affairs with them. It is a tragedy that her works in the United States were only read by intellectuals such as Arthur Miller, Herbert Marcuse, Gore Vidal and Noam Chomsky. As a secular thinker she raised the status of women without destroying the family. That is why her works and her articles bear infinitely more weight than "The Feminine Mystique"

In 1911, she hosted the International Conference of Socialist Women in Copenhagen. Many women proposed the 25th of March as the day to commemorate the tragedy and to remind women throughout the world that the struggle had just begun since the fire took place on the 25th of March 1908. We can only marvel a hundred years to the day at the inner strength and iron will of those young garment workers. They held out for 17 days. Their “Basta!” lasted that long. March the 25th is the feast of Our Lady of the Annunciation, when the Archangel Gabriel informed Mary that she would give birth to Jesus.

Rosa, ever the atheist, nixed that. She proposed a compromise. The first official protest anywhere in the world in the 20th century took place in New York on the 8th of March.

“We shall commemorate the women who perished in that holocaust every March 8 till the end of the world," said Rosa.

They did not die in vain as new laws were passed to protect children and others from slave-type labor conditions. It was a turning point in labor laws -- especially concerning health and safety.

And that is why we remember and march and feel a particular and profound passion for our Sisters, living and dead. For our Grandmothers, mothers, aunts, sisters, daughters and granddaughters. Onward Women of the Earth.

For more information about this tragic event, go to: http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/trianglefire/

For video - which includes stories from some of the survivors go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m2RvSfc4kM&feature=related