This Wednesday,10 September, during the European Parliament Plenary, a “debate” titled ”After 10 years, time to end mass migration now – protect our women and children” will be held in Strasbourg.
END FGM EU, alongside our partners are outraged that this debate was approved.
The simple title of the debate dangerously exploits fear and weaponises the safety of women and children to further promote an anti-migrant agenda. Behind this rhetoric of protection (“protect our women and children”) lies a paternalistic way of thinking that denies women their autonomy and agency. What we want is true emancipation – not a protection that, all too often, ends up being a way to limit our rights and keep us under control and justify conservative policies.
Women’s rights are increasingly being instrumentalised to feed ideological hatred and political polarisation based on racism, xenophobia, islamophobia, etc.
As feminist civil society organisations, we say NO!
The European Parliament should represent all people living in Europe, regardless of their residency status, and prioritise real issues affecting our societies. You are not talking on our behalf by bringing “women and children” into such discussions!
Instead of instrumentalizing and exploiting women’s rights to justify racist and anti-migrant agendas, the European Parliament should urgently address the actual threats women continue to face within the EU from gender-based violence, to systemic discrimination and inequalities, intersecting discriminations, and other attacks on the rights of all women in their diversity that remain far from resolved.
We urge the @eppresident Roberta Metsola to cancel this debate! Pursuant to rule 10, this debate is in blatant violation of the European Parliament’s own code of conduct, disregarding the Charter of Fundamental Rights and using fearmongering language to distract the public from real priorities.
We condemn the attempted normalisation of such language and continue our work to ensure that intersectional feminism remains the compass for our actions towards gender equality and the elimination of gender-based violence.
CONTEXT
NEWSLETTER ON POLITICO (FROM TUESDAY 8 SEPTEMBER) https://www.politico.eu/newsletter/brussels-playbook/macrons-slow-motion-car-crash/ CONTROVERSY IN PARLIAMENT: The chairs of the S&D, liberal and Green groups have written to Parliament President Roberta Metsola asking her to cancel a debate on migration scheduled for Wednesday by the far-right Patriots for Europe, unless it agrees to change the title, Max Griera writes in to report. The groups argue that the title (“After 10 years, time to end mass migration now — protect our women and children”) goes against the Parliament’s standards of non-discrimination and could encourage “hatred and violence,” the letter says.
EP RULES – https://www.europarl.europa.eu/sed/doc/ext/manual/Plenary_guide_en.pdf
EP PLENARY AGENDA: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/sedcms/documents/PRIORITY_INFO/1572/SYN_OJ_September_STR_EN.pdf
List of supporting organisations:
- OII Europe
- Women Against Violence Europe
- International Planned Parenthood Federation – European Network (IPPF EN)
- European Roma Grassroots Organisations (ERGO) Network
- Social Platform
- EL*C – Eurocentralasian Lesbian* Community
- ECRE
- PICUM
- SOLIDAR
- Federation of Young European Greens (FYEG)
- Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO)
- ILGA-Europe
- EPSU (The European Federation of Public Service Unions)
- TGEU – Trans Europe and Central Asia
- ESWA- European Sex Workers’ Rights Alliance
- #DiasporaVote!
- Mediterranean Institute of Gender studies (MIGS)
- Aidos – Italian Association for Women in Development
- Kvinna till Kvinna Foundation
- New Women Connectors
- European Network Against Racism
- IGLYO – The International LGBTQI Youth & Student Organisation
- foodwatch International
- Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS)
- FIDH (International Federation for Human Rights)
- Equinox Initiative for Racial Justice
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