Transformation

STORIES

Brazil - Ayomidê Yalodê Black Women, Holistic Protection Practices

Brazil - Ayomidê Yalodê Black Women, Holistic Protection Practices

Apoyos FAU

Every day, Brazil's black population faces diverse types of oppression, exclusions, and even systematic genocide in their communities, all of which are intensified by the lack of public policies. This is particularly evident in the lives of women, black activists, and non-binary people. Amid this reality, which was aggravated by the Covid-19 pandemic, the Collectives of Black Women Ayomidê Yalodê in Salvador de Bahía were able to establish care and protection networks that strengthened physical and digital security at the organization's shelters. Through its shelters and in close coordination with networks such as Associação Afro-cultural Casa do Mensageiro and Coletivo Feminista Filhxs do Sol, it was possible to provide a safe and equipped space to address the needs of activists and women human rights defenders, and reduce the impacts of Covid-19. Also, a variety of digital security workshops were held on communications strategies for the defense of LBTIQ+ youth rights and to establish safe communication channels for the orientation and support activities.


The organization also provided psychosocial support and accompaniment on sexual, reproductive, and non-reproductive rights, as well as strategies to face the pandemic. These initiatives were both in-person and remote, which made it possible to provide assistance to people in other states of Brazil, mainly in rural contexts. Additionally, they delivered basic baskets and hygiene kits to LBTIQ+ defenders, as a food and nutritional safety strategy to reduce the risks of infection, face the crisis and confinements. With the implementation of these strategies, the organization was able to incorporate its reflections and learnings into their actions to have a greater reception capacity for both activists and their families, in addition to having added spaces for trans people. The actions also generated community awareness and as a result, other families were willing to open their homes as an extension of the shelter’s network, thus strengthening the social fabric and community networks.


“Currently, the organization is more structured, with tasks divided among the members, we opened spaces for trans people, including trans men, because we began to understand that our struggles needed to come from a collective perspective and that within Black feminism we can't discriminate by gender.”


Crossroads

To make the balance to provide support and accompany processes throughout the Region is not an easy task. To make it happen, there is the need for political will and flexible resources or institutional support. These have been the opportunity and decision we have counted on, to contribute, for more than 11 years now, to the sustainability of activists, their collective care, and wellbeing. This small journey from the voices and experiences of activists, allow us to weave the dialogue and the richness of this exchange. May their voices and experiences be the ones to guide you.

Tatiana Cordero Velásquez

Directora Ejecutiva, FAU-LAC

Find the complete document HERE

Crossroads

Uruguay in TRANSformation: for trans peoples’ rights

Uruguay in TRANSformation: for trans peoples’ rights

Uruguay was the first Latin American country to regulate a Comprehensive Gender Identity Law in 2009.

Since then, the individuals that looked to change their name had to face a long and costly legal and administrative procedure, which not everyone could access, in addition to the stigmatization of those who tried to fulfill this right.

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TRANSforming realities, Chile's new Gender Identity Law

Organizando Trans Diversidades, is an organization that works to defend the rights of trans people in Chile. In 2011, they were behind an Anti-discrimination Law that, for the first time in Chilean national legislation, established the concept of gender identity. This process had urgent backing from UAF-LAC. Motivated by the sexual diversity movements in Bolivia and Argentina, that same year OTD’s members began advocacy efforts in the Chilean Government, to replicate in Chile the right to a Gender Identity Law.

TRANSforming realities, Chile's new Gender Identity Law

Coraje y resistencia: la historia de las mujeres campesinas en Paraguay

Coraje y resistencia: la historia de las mujeres campesinas en Paraguay

The Comisión de Víctimas de la Masacre de Curuguaty (Commission of Victims of the Curuguaty Massacre), arose as an initiative to demand justice and reparation for the incidents that took place in Curuguaty on June 15th, 2012, in the context of a peasant struggle against illegal dispossession. The land in the area have been in dispute since 1967.

The Comisión de Víctimas de la Masacre de Curuguaty (Commission of Victims of the Curuguaty Massacre), arose as an initiative to demand justice and reparation for the incidents that took place in Curuguaty on June 15th, 2012, in the context of a peasant struggle against illegal dispossession. The land in the area have been in dispute since 1967.

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Advocate for the land in Tambogrande, Peru

This story came from Quito, Ecuador, during the second meeting of the Sustainable Activism in the Andean Region program.

It discusses our ability as women to see, re-see and take care of each other in order to share with other women and find collective and personal solutions.


Bolivia’s Gender Identity Law

Bolivia’s Gender Identity Law

UAF-LAC supported the Trebble Network (Red Trébol) to approve Bolivia’s Gender Identity Law.

Thanks to the hard work and tireless struggle of trans organizations and activists in Bolivia, the country now has a “Law of Gender Identity”, or Law 807, approved by the Bolivian Plurinational Assembly on May 21st of this year. This Law establishes that, through a personal-administrative procedure, it is possible to make changes to the name, data regarding the sex, and the image of transsexual and transgendered persons.

This Law represents a significant step forward in guaranteeing the rights of trans women struggling against discrimination based on gender identity, and an advance in the recognition of the rights of trans people in the region.

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Talking with PARCES

On January 20th, 2016, the Metropolitan Police of Bogotá went to the Mariposa plaza, in the San Victorino neighborhood, and without justification violently detained 15 women sex workers. Since then, the NGO P.A.R.C.E.S. has decided to intervene with advocacy strategies and legal actions; with support from UAF-LAC they brought the case to the country's highest legal body. Learn more about this story here, in an interview with Nora Picasso, director of the organization's legal committee.

Talking with PARCES

Special on Indigenous Women and Territories in the Face of Misgovernment During the Pandemic

Special on Indigenous Women and Territories in the Face of Misgovernment During the Pandemic

Vivencias actuales de mujeres indígenas en seis países de América Latina. 

En el 2020, la pandemia del Covid-19 desató una crisis en distintos ámbitos de la vida, con impactos particulares en la vida de las comunidades. En América Latina esta crisis ha develado y profundizado las desigualdades sociales históricas, atravesadas por razones de raza, clase, género, orientación sexual, edad y discapacidad, entre otras. La pandemia y las respuestas de los gobiernos frente a esta, han traído mayores afectaciones para las poblaciones que ya enfrentaban discriminaciones y violencias estructurales y la precarización en los servicios de salud, educación, empleos formales y acceso a redes de información. Esta situación ha afectado aún más gravemente a las comunidades rurales productoras de alimentos que, por depender en gran parte de la economía informal, han visto en riesgo sus ingresos y posibilidades de sostenimiento comunitario. Lo que se suma al creciente riesgo de contagio debido a la continuidad de las actividas extractivas en sus territorios durante las medidas de cuarentena.

Actualmente en la Región, el virus está en una fase de internalización, alcanzando a muchas comunidades rurales y territorios alejados de las grandes ciudades. En este contexto, los pueblos indígenas están siendo los más afectados por la pandemia. Al respeto, la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos (CIDH) por medio de la “Resolución Pandemia y Derechos Humanos en las Américas”, reconoce a los pueblos indígenas como “grupos en situación de especial vulnerabilidad”. Aunque la pandemia ha tenido un desarrollo particular en cada país, la situación en las comunidades pone de manifiesto similitudes regionales, donde se constata la falta de respuesta efectiva por parte de los gobiernos para garantizar los derechos y la protección efectiva de los pueblos indígenas ante la expansión del virus.

No obstante, el Covid-19 no es la primera pandemia que los pueblos indígenas enfrentan, ni tampoco la primera crisis que impacta sus cuerpos, sus vidas y su pervivencia física y cultural. Las comunidades han mantenido y construido sus modos de vida y permanencia con base en conocimientos ancestrales y adaptaciones colectivas al contexto global y local, desde las primeras invasiones a sus territorios hace más de 500 años. Por ello, para el FAU-AL es un compromiso político y ético crucial en estos tiempos, denunciar la situación que se está viviendo en los territorios indígenas, desde las propias voces de las mujeres que los defienden.

Para contar estas historias conspiramos junto a dos medios feministas con una línea editorial desde y para el Sur: La Ruda en Guatemala, la primera revista digital dedicada exclusivamente a relatos de mujeres defensoras de los territorios de Abya Yala y AZminas en Brasil, que através de su revista y app, mezclan el periodismo, la tecnología y la información veraz, para luchar contra el machismo. Ambos medios se dieron a la tarea de ahondar en los contextos de las comunidades que acompañamos desde el Fondo de Acción Urgente para América Latina y a su vez, hilar estos relatos con los de mujeres de otros territorios cercanos a sus experiencias activistas. Juntas creamos dos reportajes que entrelazan las vivencias actuales de mujeres indígenas en seis países de América Latina.

Aunque muchos pueblos indígenas no cuentan con el apoyo estatal necesario para enfrentar la pandemia, desde el autogobierno las protagonistas de estas historias y sus comunidades, se organizan para garantizar el sostenimiento de la vida desde el cuidado colectivo, sus saberes ancestrales y la solidaridad entre los pueblos y las personas. Los pueblos indígenas siguen en permanente resistencia para que su vida, sus territorios y derechos sean garantizados por los Estados.

Como Fondo feminista regional de Acción Urgente, nuestra misión es contribuir a la sostenibilidad y el fortalecimiento de los movimientos de mujeres y feministas, apoyando las resistencias y demandas de las defensoras y activistas en la transformación de sistemas de injusticia y desigualdad. Por ello, buscamos con esta iniciativa periodística visibilizar la actual resistencia de las guardianas de la vida y apoyar sus acciones transformadoras, que permiten la pervivencia de sus pueblos y la memoria viva de sus mayoras y mayores. Así mismo, queremos elevar sus voces de denuncia ante los gobiernos, para que las medidas necesarias de protección y mitigación de la pandemia sean respetuosas de sus derechos, prácticas y cosmovisiones.


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