Salt Lake City marks International Women’s Day with Capitol rally
Salt Lake City – At least 50 people gathered at the Utah State Capitol on Saturday afternoon, March 7, for an International Women’s Day rally organized by the Freedom Road Socialist Organization.
The event was cosponsored by the Utah Anti-War Committee, Armed Queers of Salt Lake City and MMIR Utah.
The protest’s demands included “Free Venezuela’s First Lady Cilia Flores; justice for the schoolgirls killed in a U.S. strike in Iran; stop attacks on transgender health care for minors, and oppose anti-immigrant legislation such as HB 88. Participant chants included “Spencer Cox has got to go!” and “Abortion is worth fighting for!”
Speakers at the rally included a member of Armed Queers of Salt Lake City, Tammy Dee Platero of MMIR Utah and Sebastian Miscenich of Freedom Road Socialist Organization
“MMIR is not just a movement — it’s a mother up at 3 a.m. waiting for her daughter to come home. It’s a partner waiting for a phone call, or an auntie searching for her niece,” intoned Dee Platero of MMIR Utah, putting a human face to the epidemic of missing and murdered Native Americans in the U.S.
A member of Armed Queers of Salt Lake City said, “By being complicit and capitulating to their status quo we allow them to think that they have the power over generations of fierce trans and queer organizers that will not stop until we are free!”
““The bombing in Iran at Minab killed more than 100 girls at an elementary school. This exposes the lies of war apologists about how the rights of Iranian women and LGBTQ people make their criminal aggression against Iran justified,” Sebastian Miscenichof Freedom Road Socialist Organization said in his speech. “It is in the interest of the vast majority of women and queer people both in Iran and here in the U.S. that our common oppressors lose this war!”
Organizers encouraged the crowd to remain active in the movement, attend organizing meetings, and help plan upcoming events.