STANDING AGAINST SEXISM AND SEXUAL HARASSMENT
While there are many groups out there calling themselves “Brown Berets”, this organization was founded by a woman who had been working within Brown Beret circles for years. Like most women, she too came from a background of emotional, mental, verbal, physical, and sexual abuse. When she came into the movement she hoped that she would find a space for healing and justice, where women were valued and their voices would be heard, but what she saw in many circles was a continuation of that misogyny, machismo, sexism, harassment, abuse and violence against women. She herself became a victim of the men in Movement spaces that would sexually harass her and when she would not reciprocate they would become angered and would attack her or have her removed from certain spaces claiming she was toxic. Even the women within these circles had internalized that sexism and continued that lateral oppression tearing each other down, destroying each other’s reputations and work, and being apologist for these male abusers!
Last year, in 2022, two well known female organizers from Northern California came to her asking for help with a male claiming to be a Brown Beret, who was harassing them. She spoke out and respectfully asked the “Mesa Nacional de Brown Berets” for help. It was her brother-in-law, and being that she knew him for years, knew about his alcoholism, and that he had been accused of sexual harassment before, she knew that as a Brown Beret she needed to protect the community, even it's family, there can be no tolerarating abusive behavior! La Mesa is an alliance that was formed a few years ago of small autonomous groups calling themselves Brown Berets. Initially they investigated, called the victims, and they all saw what he did was harassment and they supported renouncing him and removing him from their circles, but because they were all friends he denied it saying she had a personal vendetta against him, and they quickly jumped in to support him and denounced her. To this day he is being protected by them and the attacks against her have increased. Her “crime”, she denounced a serial sexual harasser, and her “punishment”, as they recently posted a statement, they demanded that she remove her Beret and dismantle all the work she had done for years. WHY? Why would they want a woman who has been successfully organizing and is known by thousands of people to stop working? They have threatened to sue her for defamation, to beat her up, to blacklist her from every group they have connections to, have slandered her calling her a whore, tried to destroy her family by claiming she is cheating on her husband, and that she is cointelpro and working for the FBI. They even created an "Elders Council" of mostly older patriarchal men who's only purpose seems to be to address her and keep in check.
Seeing the hostility and that she was not going to get any support from this so-called “Mesa Nacional”, she officially broke ties with them and launched a new National Organization with the emphasis on healing and empowering mujeres through a Matriarchal Militant structure and restoring balance to the Movement. It is time to stop the abuse and patriarchy that has run unchecked in the Brown Beret movement for the past 56 years! Every other group is led by a man, has been for five decades, but now the Brown Berets will be led into a new direction. No more postering and grandstanding! No more performative activism! No more silencing women and forcing them to comply or else. If the revolutionary movement is to continue, the issue of sexual harassment and abuse must be addressed and rectified. There is so much work that needs to be done in our communities, and THIS issue has held us back and destroyed our organizing efforts for decades! Not just in the Brown Berets, but EVERYWHERE! No matter how much you sugar coat shit, it is still shit, and until you realize what you are consuming, you will continue to eat shit!
So let's have a clear discussion. Women are half the population, but they do the majority of the work in the Movement. Every organization is full of women working, supporting, and building, yet men get all the credit. Women are still being hyper sexualized, even in the movement, as men (Macktavists) push the boundaries hoping to capitalize on the sexual liberation that women have found. Women are still being told that they are weak and that the ONLY way for them to organize, is HORIZONTALLY, through consensus, because “god-forbid” that a woman should rise up to be a national leader within a structured military organization, with a powerful voice, and the willingness to fight and destroy our enemies! It is sexism to keep a woman down, to make her think that the only thing she is good for is to be a humble activist, making signs, singing songs, praying, cooking, and looking pretty in the corner. WE CALL BULLSHIT! Women are warriors and fighters too! They smoke, drink, have tattoos, cuss, and stand up for themselves and their voices should never be limited! So yes, we stand against the so-called Mesa Nacional for harboring sexual abusers and we will not back down from this fight.
Here you have a voice. Join the Brown Beret Organization and help us take a stand against the Patriarchy!