Icelandic women‘s organizations and labor unions are calling for a women‘s strike on October 24th 2018, to protest gender income inequality and violence and harassment in the workplace.
Their demand is Don’t Change Women, Change the World!
In recent months, stories of harassment, violence and injustice women suffer in the workplace have been shared on social media under the hashtag #MeToo. These stories have made it clear that fight for gender equality in the workplace cannot only be about equal pay, but must also be about safety in the workplace.
Women should be safe at work and safe at home. The focus now is to put pressure on companies and the government to change how they deal with misogyny, harassment and violence in the workplace and to make sure all employers have regulations and protocol for when incidents occur.
Women‘s solidarity and women‘s protests in Iceland have driven social change. This is the sixth time that women in Iceland have gone on a strike for gender equality under the banner of Kvennafrí (Women’s Day Off). They walked out in 1975, 1985, 2005, 2010 and 2016. However, even if they have made great gains in the past four decades towards gender equality, they still have not reached full equality.
