Women march against Trump

Hundreds of thousands of women took to the streets in Washington to protest against US president Donald Trump on January 21, the day after his inauguration. Over sixty other cities throughout the world joined the outpouring of discontent with Trump’s ‘misogynistic’ rhetoric and behavior with marches and rallies of their own, where participants – men as well as women – carried placards with messages “Nasty woman” (in reference to how Trump called his rival Hillary Clinton during a presidential debate) and his other infamous remarks.

The Washington march, which is estimated to have drawn about half a million people, featured speeches by many celebrities, including singers Madonna, Cher, Alicia Keys, Katy Perry, actors Julia Roberts, Ashley Judd, Scarlett Johansson, Emma Watson, Amy Schumer, Jake Gyllenhaal, and film director Michael Moore.

“Welcome to the revolution of love,” Madonna addressed the crowd. “To the rebellion. To our refusal as women to accept this new age of tyranny. Where not just women are in danger but all marginalized people. Where people uniquely different might be considered a crime. It took us this darkness to wake us the f… up.”

Civil rights activist Angela Davis also spoke at the Women’s March on Washington. “The next 1,459 days of the Trump administration will be 1,459 days of resistance: resistance on the ground, resistance in the classrooms, resistance on the job, resistance in our art and in our music. This is just the beginning.”

Scarlett Johansson made a public plea to Trump, saying: “President Trump, I did not vote for you . . . I want to be able to support you. But first I ask that you support me, support my sister, support my mother.”

Hundreds of thousands of anti-Trump protesters descended on New York, Los Angeles and other cities throughout the USA. Sympathy rallies were held in London and other major European cities. Georgia’s Tbilisi pitched in too with a dozens-strong protest walk along its central avenue.

The Washington March began with a Facebook post by a Hawaii resident Teresa Shook. “What if women marched on Washington around Inauguration Day en masse?” she wrote on her wall. The post became viral, as women activists from across the country supported the call. A knitted pink hat called pussy-hat (another reference to a lewd comment by Trump) became the symbol of the protests, as many protesters wore it.

Donald Trump reacted to the protests with a tweet: “Watched protests yesterday but was under the impression that we just had an election! Why didn’t these people vote? Celebs hurt cause badly.”