March 8, 2006

Happy International Women's Day from Radical Women

Dear Friends,
Around the world, workingclass women keep alive the radical tradition of International Women's Day as an opportunity to demand our rights and freedom. Today we salute courageous sisters in all corners of the globe, from Palestinian mothers fighting for their homeland to Venezuelans seeking a just society, from Sudanese women combating rape and genocide to Hurricane Katrina survivors battling for medical care, housing, food, education, employment, and the right to return to their own homes.

Within the United States, the struggle for fundamental civil liberties continues. Radical Women has defended Lynne Stewart, a veteran human rights attorney falsely convicted of aiding terrorists, who was targeted by the government in the effort to silence dissent. We have demonstrated against the dangerous anti-immigrant Minutemen and the criminal U.S. war in Iraq. We've mobilized for abortion rights and reproductive justice and expect a pitched battle over these basic human rights in the coming year.

Radical Women has also built cross-border solidarity in collaboration with Iraqi women and Central American sisters, and formed new contacts at recent meetings of the World Social Forum. Because we live in the earth's greatest exporter of misery and violence, the greatest act of assistance we can provide to the world's people is to achieve a socialist revolution right here in the heartland of capitalism. With a workingclass rainbow of women and men, people of color, indigenous nations, immigrants, lesbians/gays/bisexuals/transsexuals, youth and elders we can do it!

Long live International Women's Day and the global leadership of women as a force for human survival and revolutionary change!

Anne Slater
National Organizer
Radical Women, U.S. Section
Natradicalwomen@aol.com
www.RadicalWomen.org

Radical Women
1908 Mission Street
San Francisco, CA 94103
Phone: 415-864-1278