Our feminism is anti-racist and our migrant solidarity is feminist! - Speech for the Int. Women's Strike, March 8th

We are here today as Migszol, the Migrant Solidarity Group of Hungary. We are a political activist group of migrants, refugees, and Hungarians fighting for the rights of people impacted by the border regimes of Europe and Hungary. 

As Migszol we came to say that we are standing in solidarity with the women’s strike and feminist struggles. And we came to say that feminism is essential for anti-racist and migrant solidarity work. We gather our strength from the teachings of anti-racist and anti-capitalist feminism that shows the urgency of cross-border solidarity.

This is a strike, a strike for reproductive rights, a strike for economic self-determination and a strike against violence. It is migrant and refugee women who are especially affected by these points of oppression. 

Yesterday a law was passed that means that all people seeking asylum will be detained in containers at the border. Everyday people trying to cross to Hungary get beaten up by the police at the border. Additionally to this violence, women face very high risk of sexual violence and human trafficking on their travel routes, stuck at borders and in overcrowded camps and detention. We demand to stop the violence against all women!

Refugee and migrant women do not get any support by the Hungarian government to be able to find work, if so they are often stuck in very bad working conditions. Legal status determines the access to health care, including birth control. After people get a refugee status in Hungary, they do not get support with housing and after half a year lose their health insurance. On a European level, difficulties are similar for Hungarian women migrants working in Western European countries, who are often forced to work in precarious and underpaid works, regularly unreported. It often unables having access to health-care and to safe housing. The lack of support puts refugee women in Hungary, but also Hungarian migrant women in Western countries in very high risk. We demand reproductive rights and economic self-determination for all women!

The country as well as the rest of Europe and the West is swamped with racist propaganda about migration and moral panic created about ‘white women’s security’ is used as justification for racist politics. This is not the feminism we want. We must think our struggles together. In Hungary, it is the same government that places women, Roma, refugees, people of color, homeless people, LGBTQI and poor people at the margins of society. Globally it is capitalism, patriarchy and racism that produce the threats to so many people’s lives. 
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We are happy to be here and we are united in our rage. Our feminism is anti-racist and our migrant solidarity is feminist! Our struggles are shared struggles.