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Chiara Páez was 14 and pregnant when her body was found dead, buried in her boyfriend's courtyard on May 9.
The story about her murder has since ignited deep-seated rage across Argentina; this has culminated in an organized march to Congress set for June 3 in solidarity with Chiara and against femicide.
With the hashtag “Ni Una Menos” (Not One Less), Argentines are inciting a national conversation through social media on the systemic dehumanization, exploitation and murder of women in the country.
That Chiara's murder has triggered such mass condemnation this week is because her case is not seen in isolation. Rather, activists are pointing at shocking statistics gathered by the feminist organization “La Casa del Encuentro” who found that 277 women were killed in 2014, among whom 36 were adolescents. These are unofficial numbers because currently these murders are neither monitored nor registered by public institutions.
“Aren't we going to raise our voice? THEY ARE KILLING US” Marcela Ojeda, an Argentinian journalist, wrote on Twitter with the trending #NiUnaMenos. Other female journalists followed Ojeda and were joined by actors, writers and other public figures. As the hashtag went viral on social media, activists saw the opportunity to organize a march to National Congress against femicide.
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Every 30 hours a woman is killed “simply for being,” Andrea D'Atri wrote in an opinion piece for La Izquierda Diario.
“How is it possible that a man comes to consider a woman like an object of his property to the extent that he can consider disposing her life? To explain it as an anomaly, an eccentricity caused by a psychopathology, does not help to unravel why female deaths occur like a gruesome litany without interruption every 30 hours,” she wrote.
On June 3 women from the feminist organization “Pan y Rosas,” Bread and Roses in English, together with legislators, deputies from left-wing political parties and thousands of Argentines will march to Congress to demand a national emergency for gender-based violence and press for urgent measures to prevent it.
“We join the demands for justice for the victims, but we also know that it is necessary to organize and put in place a movement of struggle of thousands of women workers, students, housewives in all workplaces, study, neighborhoods, in order to fight for all our rights,” D' Atri said.
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#NiUnaMenos el 3/6 en el congreso! pic.twitter.com/QC45DAtVKo
— La Cope (@lacopecope)
May 12, 2015
3 de junio. Plaza Congreso. Basta de femicidios. #NiUnaMenos pic.twitter.com/zQSz1ti3C7
— Liniers (@porliniers)
May 12, 2015
#NiUnaMenos @PiaShaw @laubfal @AMtelefe RT pic.twitter.com/SKz9e5diwa
— vero lozano (@lozanoveroam)
May 15, 2015
SUMATE #NiUnaMenos pic.twitter.com/rVaVBvb7jO
— • Cin†i∂ • (@CiiiiinG)
May 14, 2015
