Contact: AF3IRM Las Vegas [email protected]

On March 8, 2021, our national organizing body called for a return to the origins of International Working Women’s Day in support of our sisters in the global south, who have tirelessly fought not just in the past year, but for most of their lives, inheriting critical struggles from their mothers and grandmothers. AF3IRM Las Vegas answered this call with our mothers’ unpaid labor in mind- the same feminist labor that kept our families and communities afloat. Honoring Our Grandmother’s Labor created a safe space for AF3IRM Las Vegas to recognize the often thankless grind that allowed us as daughters of revolutionary foremothers to continue our fight towards genuine liberation. 

As our mothers and grandmothers shared their stories, we could feel the physical and emotional pain in their voices. They are teachers, laundry feeders, caretakers, farmworkers, insurance writers, food service workers, accountants, mothers, grandmothers, all with one focus. For most of their lives, they focused on the hopes of providing their family with better opportunities— the Amerikkkan dream fed to them by our oppressors. While we take away a sense of gratitude and privilege, we can’t help but be filled with rage, as we acknowledge this struggle women of color have faced for generation after generation. Why weren’t the women who raised us able to achieve the careers that they dreamed of? Why were they forced to accept low wages and undervalued positions? They were bound by the shackles of an imperialist, hetero-patriarchal society that left no room for them to dream their own dreams. 

Today, as transnational feminists, we recognize that the fight is not over. Under a capitalist system where success is measured by shattering glass ceilings, we know all too well the concrete barriers that have been placed to limit women of color. We dream ahead of a world where our future daughters are free to exist— a generation liberated from the chains of these oppressive systems.