We don’t do what we do because it’s easy. We have no illusions that change will be handed to us. We do this work because we recognize that systemic inequalities and injustices will not end on their own.
This International Women’s Day, you’ll see our posters online and across Amsterdam, designed by art director Marleen Geerts, pointing at some of the injustices we refuse to accept.
Femicide. Period poverty. The gender pay gap. The exclusion of women from medical research. The underfunding of menstrual and reproductive health research.
These aren’t separate issues, but rather interconnected symptoms of the same system.
Whether in the US, across Europe or in the Netherlands, the far right continues to attack fundamental rights such as bodily autonomy, silencing dissent and protest, and exploiting economic inequalities, while fear-mongering about marginalized groups. Their argument is that the world is naturally unequal, whether in the streets, schools, businesses or homes. They would have us believe that some lives are worth more than others. And that we should hush, and be grateful for the scraps we get.
But we are done with silence, and with waiting.
Femicide and violence against women are a public crisis, not a private tragedy.
Women are being murdered because they are women. And yet, governments — including our own — are failing to take appropriate action. In 2024, the Netherlands had the highest rate of femicide in all of Europe. The shocking statistics don’t end there, with nearly half (45%) of all women in the Netherlands experiencing physical and/or sexual violence in their lifetime. Rape within marriage was only criminalized in 1991, while the Dutch Parliament recognized sex without consent as rape only last year. In 2024, 52% of girls aged 18 to 24 reported being victims of sexual harassment. Online, female politicians and journalists experience significantly more aggression and violence than their male colleagues, especially if they represent a certain ethnicity or sexual orientation. According to 2024 research by Atria, nearly one in three women indicate that they have experienced three or more online incidents of aggression in the past 12 months.
Period poverty is very real.
Our 2024 research concludes that more than 765,000 people in the Netherlands are unable to afford menstrual products. Too many are forced to choose between food and the products they need for menstruation. Despite an increase in attention, this issue continues to be relatively invisible — one that social media platforms like Meta even suppress (by labeling content including terms such as “period products”, “tampons” and “pads” as being in their words “sexual content”).
Women’s bodies are missing from medical research, and reproductive and menstrual health is underfunded.
Medications are still primarily tested on male bodies, leading to misdiagnosis, painful side effects, and dangerous health gaps. Even medical studies on issues that disproportionately affect women, such as chronic pain, are still primarily tested on men (and male mice). Endometriosis, PCOS, heavy menstrual bleeding—conditions that impact millions—are underfunded and under-researched.
The gender pay gap is not closing nearly fast enough.
At the current rate, women’s economic equality is still decades away. According to national statistics, in 2020 women in the private sector earned almost 5 euros (19 %) less than men. The data is clear: women continue to earn less for doing the same work with the same qualifications, and they carry an unequal share of unpaid labor, whether in the office or at home.
Meanwhile… the Dutch governing coalition is stopping all development funding for women’s rights, gender equality and education. They’re slashing funding to UNICEF by 50%. They’re ending priority access to Dutch social housing for refugees (where the average wait for a place to live is otherwise 7 years), all but guaranteeing chaos in refugee centres, which are already overfilled because the government continues to close the few remaining shelters.
We will not remain silent.
Take action with us:
• See one of our posters? Share it. Talk about it. Download it. Post it. These messages are meant to be seen.
• Follow us here, on Instagram or LinkedIn, as we launch a new video about period poverty on Friday, March 7th. Even sharing information about menstruation is becoming harder — as Meta suppresses our content. But we will not be silenced, and we need your help to spread awareness by sharing our video.
• Use your voice. Bring up these issues where they are ignored—at work, in schools, in conversations with friends and family. For these reasons and many more, come Saturday, March 8th, join us at the 2025 Feminist March (1 pm at Dam Square).
• Support feminist organizations like us. Those actively and effectively addressing matters of justice will need resources to keep going. Fund them.
The world won’t change by itself. Let’s go make noise–and good trouble.
Have you spotted our posters in the streets of Amsterdam?
PS: Want to join in, too? Make your own wheat paste glue like our volunteers, and find a free spot to put up our posters!
Download our 6 posters
