Work? Of course, but also having equal pay for equal roles and tasks. Being free to dress as we like? Of course, but also not to be judged for what we wear. Being free to choose about our body? Of course, but also to not feel alone and exclusively relegated to the role of mother.
A woman, a child, a girl, find themselves immersed and subjected to a patriarchal system long before realizing it, long before receiving a slap, a shove. Of being killed.
Violence against women is not just that: it is not just the final and bloody act. No. Violence comes much earlier: from the denial of a job and having friends, from insufficient pay to isolation. Everything mixes, everything relates to each other, everyone interconnects seamlessly: in the private and in the public and in the private and in the public.
What do we really need? Of the memory, of course, of all the murdered women, of their names one by one. Even a red bench, if needed. But it’s not enough.
What we are seriously interested in is that we begin to address the patriarchal system. Let men do it, first and foremost they act violence and more: have you ever thought about it that, in part, the undergo? Make no mistake: they grew up on bread and rights denied to women, in contexts that push them to reproduce the domination and oppression of which others are the creators. And everything becomes “normal”.
So what do we women really need? Well, the word prevention would be the right one. A process – not very complicated – which reviews school choices and job search, maternity and even retirement, up to and including gender violence in the strict sense.
What does it mean to be a woman in Italy today?
The 2024 Gender Report of the INPS Steering and Supervision Council, published a few months ago, tells us this clearly.
More titles, less power
Italian girls study more than their male peers, they graduate earlier and graduate in higher percentages (in single-cycle master’s degrees they reach 68.6%). Yet, this educational advantage does not translate into equal opportunities in the world of work.
So? An educated but not economically independent woman is exposed to forms of dependence and vulnerability that can fuel abusive situations.
Unstable employment and risk of addiction
In 2023, only 52.5% of women were working, compared to 70.4% of men. Even among graduates, entry into the world of work is more difficult and often less stable.
In the South, the situation is even more serious: in Sicily, Campania and Puglia over 24% of young people between 15 and 29 are NEET, neither studying nor working. A suspended generation, without the tools to build an independent life.
So? Economic independence is one of the main protective factors against domestic violence.
Care and motherhood: an obstacle still on women’s shoulders
Almost half of women between 15 and 64 are inactive (42.3%), compared to 24.3% of men. Reconciliation between work and family remains an unresolved issue.
So? When services and supports are lacking, it is women who pay the price: fewer working hours, limited opportunities, economic dependence.
So? What do we really need?
Symbolic gestures are not enough. To prevent violence you need:
The red benches are important to remember. But to change things you need income, opportunities, freedom of choice, tools to get out of situations of dependency. As long as a woman is forced to give up work due to lack of services, or remains trapped in toxic relationships because she cannot afford to leave, we will not be able to say that we are truly preventing violence.
All nice, but male education towards respect and equality is also needed
Everything must go hand in hand, including educating men. Without this, nothing changes. If we don’t also work on the education of boys and men, the root of the problem remains thereintact.
The prevention of violence necessarily involves a new way of teaching respect, and this must be done with the same energy with which we ask for rights and autonomy for women.
It is not enough to tell girls to be strong: we must tell boys that strength is not control, it is not power over others, but the ability to welcome, listen, accept no. We must teach that fragility is not weakness, that loving does not mean possessing.
We need to act on multiple levels, with courage and foresight:
Because a man who knows how to be in a relationship – with respect, with reciprocity, with awareness of himself and his own limits – is a man who does not need to exercise power to feel “strong”.
Educating respect means teaching that the other is not something to be managed, but someone to meet. That’s where we start if we really want to change things.
