#8M TO MAKE VISIBLE THE INVISIBLE

International Women's Day 2021 finds us experiencing a Pandemic and calls us to recognize the leadership of women and the efforts they make to lead their communities and organizations towards an equal future in a context of health, economic and social crisis.

We have come a long way since the 1908 textile workers' strike in Chicago and New York, where they protested the harsh working conditions, and the Copenhagen Conference in 1911, where Clara Zetkin proposed this international commemoration.

Thanks to the determination and vision of many women in the history of humanity in different times and cultures - and also of men like John Stuart Mill in England, Qasim Amin in Egypt or Frederick Douglass in the United States, today, in most of our countries, women have the right to vote, to study, to work, to undertake, to travel alone, to freely decide our marital status and to plan our families, among other civil, social and political rights.

Gone are the legal restrictions that forbid us to marry after divorce or the rules of those codes in which we were described as unable to understand public affairs and we were on the same level as furniture.

Women are on the front lines of the Covid-19 crisis as health workers, caregivers, innovators, and community organizers. Women are also among the most exemplary and effective national leaders in the fight against the pandemic.

However, the road is still long and requires from us to be alert and on the move. The crisis has highlighted both the fundamental importance of women's contributions, as well as the negative impact of the unequal distribution of the domestic burden, the increase in GBV - in cruelty and recurrence - and the stubborn invisibility that still covers our lives, contributions and experiences.

This March 8, I propose to put aside our differences and unite to commemorate the history of our struggle as gender and to manifest for what still outrages us. I invite you to make visible the invisible, to name what hurts us and what restores our hope, because what is shared, exists. For example, we can start to:

Name the women who have been murdered in crimes of gender violence. In my country, they are Ariana, Bartolita, Pamela, Brenda, Mariana, Yorka, Herlin, Stefanía, Kimberly and Damaris, victims of feminicide so far in 2021 in Chile, whose names are added to the macabre list of deaths due to sexist violence that adds up and continues without stopping throughout our continents.

Promote the struggle of women rights defenders in all areas. Those who stand up against the precariousness of life that war, racism, human trafficking, drug trafficking, sexual violence, environmental depredation or water pollution mean.

Build memory about the role that our female ancestors had in forging us as women. The women of history and those of our own history, whose wisdom accompanies and strengthens us.

Recognize the women who organize in neighborhoods and grass roots to mobilize people and resources in times of Covid-19, whose actions are essential to sustain our communities.

Give space to the voices of disabled women and those living with mental health problems, as well as those belonging to historically marginalized groups. They have a place in all decision-making bodies. They are not mere beneficiaries of our activisms and policies, but political subjects and diverse equal citizens.

Value what the women in our life give us every day. The daily support we receive from our friends, sisters, colleagues and daughters, what they teach us about them and ourselves.

March 8 is a day of solidarity and memory that strengthens our power to change the narrative, challenge the status quo and shake things up. We women are the immovable engine of social change.

On this March 8, let's make visible the invisible, so that our actions and experiences are known and contribute to the creation of a legacy that inspires other women and men to dream more, to learn more, to do more for inclusive societies , to seek equality as a requirement of good living and personal fulfillment through the collective good.