SOCIALIST Party mayoral hopeful Caitríona Ní Chatháin has spoken out about the rise in attacks on female election candidates and campaigners in recent weeks.
Ms Ní Chatháin says there has a rise in verbal and sometimes physical attacks and intimidation towards female election candidates and activists in Limerick and across Ireland.
“Not being able to challenge people on their politics, nefarious far-right characters have been resorting to bullying, racism, and misogyny,” she told the Limerick Post.
“This isn’t surprising, because bullying, racism, and misogyny is the basis of far-right ideology.”
The Socialist Party candidate said that “these attacks have included screaming at candidates while they are leafleting and putting up posters, and harassment online – with many comments just mocking these female candidates’ appearance”.
“And because these men are cowards, the attacks usually happen when the candidate/activist is alone, in a small group, or online.”
The victims of these attacks, she explained, include people she has stood with at protests on housing, healthcare, anti-racism, feminism, and the war in Palestine.
“The people attacking these women have never been at a protest for anything. They have never tried to better the lives of anyone in Limerick, they just aim to make the lives of all minorities here worse – be they women, LGBTQIA, people of colour, or migrant.”
She also suggested that “the escalation of these forms of violence isn’t happening in a vacuum.”
“Another incident happened last Saturday at our weekly Palestine protest. There is usually a gender balance at these protests, but last week it was majority women attendees. The protest was led by women, with myself and two other women leading the chants. For the first time since these protests began last October, three separate men tried to viciously shut down the protest. These cowards only backed down and left when two male attendees at the protest went up to them.”
In a message to those agitating protests, the candidate and social campaigner said: “I would also like to make it clear, if any of these cowards see this, while the attacks you perpetrate may be done in isolation, we don’t live in isolation, and you won’t force us into it. The victims of these attacks may not agree with each other on a lot of political issues, but what we all agree on is that we should be able to debate and talk about our politics democratically.”
“And what we also agree on is that bullying, racism, and misogyny has no place in politics, in Limerick, or anywhere.”
