On the anniversary of the anti-fascist mobilization in Charlottesville, in response to a call for a weekend of international solidarity, we’ve received a solidarity statement from the Collectif des Mères Solidaires in France, the Collective of Mothers in Solidarity.

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One year ago, we felt with you the pride of seeing a powerful anti-fascist movement rise up against a far-right and white-supremacist gathering in Virginia.

We also felt the terrible sadness of seeing a young woman who stood up against all forms of discrimination murdered by fascist hatred: Heather Heyer, this shining face, this strong and at the same time calm determination to refuse the unacceptable. Too much light, too much determination…

This is the same hate that in Paris in 2013 killed Clément Méric, an 18-year-old syndicalist and anti-fascist militant.

Elsewhere in Europe, fascism or state repression have claimed the lives of Carlos Palomino, Pavlos Fyssas, Carlo Giuliani, Renato Biagetti, Dax, and so many other young people whose names will forever be associated with the struggle for a world liberated from white supremacy, bigotry, and social injustice.

We write from France as the mothers of young militants who have suffered violence or repression as a result of their activism.

Like Susan Bro, Heather’s mother, we are proud of the struggles of our children.

We know that they pay, or risk paying, very dearly for their refusal of an unjust society that is imposed upon them by the powerful. Death, violence, criminal charges, imprisonment… They are familiar with all of this. We have lived it alongside them.

And we affirm as loudly and as strongly as we can, a thousand times over, that our children are right for fighting back!

Our own struggle, as their mothers, is to bring attention to their words—words too often neglected, deformed, or caricatured.

The fight against the vision of the world spread by the far right must be the business of every generation, each one in its own way.

Mothers from Italy and Spain, whose parents knew fascism and Francoism, have shown us the path forward.

Alongside them, we are in the process of forming an International Network of Anti-Fascist Mothers in order to mutually support one another and to be present wherever struggles are taking place.

We are organizing to support everyday struggles in the neighborhoods targeted by racists, in the schools, and in the prisons; as well as the mobilizations that the entire world will be watching, such as that of this weekend, August 11-12, 2018, in Charlottesville.

We are pleased to associate ourselves with this great movement of resistance, to which your courage has summoned us. We send you our gratitude.

Collectif des Mères Solidaires//Collective of Mothers in Solidarity

Meres-Solidaires@riseup.net

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Collectif des Mères Solidaires: Who We Are

A collective to support victims of fascism and state repression.

We live in a Europe that boasts of being a haven of peace, freedom, prosperity, and justice, built upon the blood shed by the partisans during the battles to liberate it from fascism. However, our children, engaged in various social and political struggles, are beaten, arrested, sentenced, and in some cases killed by state authorities or fascists.

We, their mothers, affirm that the politics conducted by the governments of Europe are responsible, directly or indirectly, for this:

• By thwarting our children’s aspirations to transform our societies and standing in the way of experimentation with alternative models founded on cooperation and self-organization.

• By ignoring calls to respect human rights and the earth in order to defend the economic interests of the wealthy, exacerbating social injustices in their own countries and throughout the world.

• By provoking hopelessness throughout society, by encouraging fear of foreigners, by tolerating or allying themselves with violent movements of the extreme right, they facilitate the resurgence of fascism that terrorizes and kills.

Exercising their freedoms of expression and of struggle, our children denounce injustice, discrimination, and the unrestrained capitalism that is ravaging the world. They defend their rights and those of the most marginalized. They fight against all forms of the drift towards fascism. They struggle for a world based in solidarity, openness, and respect for the environment.

Because they dare to take a stand against the state, they are considered a threat. And they face disproportionate repression from:

• Police forces that use instruments of death, beatings, and arrests against those who don’t present any real danger;

• A justice system that enables police impunity and mobilizes any means at its disposal, particularly imprisonment, against those who it wants to silence;

• A prison system that violates the most basic human rights.

The state institutes these police, judicial, and carceral forms of violence as its normal mode of functioning to serve the powerful and to criminalize social, environmental, and political struggles.

Because we have raised them with the values of truth, solidarity, justice, and freedom, we, their mothers, demand justice and freedom for our children.

We denounce:

• The fact that these states designate them as enemies of the Republic and of democracy, and seek to paralyze them through intimidation;

• The violence and repression that is exercised against them;

• The fact that these states tolerate the existence of fascist or neo-Nazi groups and on occasion guarantee them impunity.

Faced with the powerlessness of individual protest, we unite our voices so that those of our children may be heard. We share the struggles of other mothers, in Europe and throughout the world. We help and support one another.

We will neither forget nor abandon one another. We will not allow our devastated hearts to be engulfed by the silence of the cemetery or crushed by the humiliation of prisons.

For mothers like us, the slums where the children of migrants face discrimination, the refugee camps and the detention centers where those fleeing poverty, war, or political repression in their country are humiliated—these will always be spaces of mobilization.

And the anniversaries of the deaths of our children will always remind us of the urgent necessity of struggle.

-Collectif des Mères Solidaires—Collective of Mothers in Solidarity, France

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Au collectif antifasciste de Charlottesville

A CrimethInc.

Le message de soutien des Mères solidaires françaises

Il y a un an, nous avons ressenti avec vous la fierté de voir se lever un puissant mouvement antifasciste contre le rassemblement des extrêmes droites suprémacistes et racistes en Virginie.

Nous avons aussi ressenti la terrible douleur de voir une jeune femme militant contre toutes les formes de discriminations assassinée par la haine fasciste. Heather Heyer, ce visage lumineux, cette détermination forte et tranquille à la fois pour refuser l’inacceptable.

Trop de lumière, trop de détermination… C’est la même haine qui a tué en 2013, à Paris, Clément Méric, jeune militant syndicaliste et antifasciste de 18 ans.

Et aussi, en Europe, Carlos Palomino, Pavlos Fyssas, Carlo Giuliani, Renato Biagetti, Dax… et tant d’autres jeunes dont les noms sont pour toujours associés au combat pour un monde libéré du racisme, du suprématisme, de l’injustice sociale.

Nous sommes des mères de jeunes militants français victimes de violence ou de répression du fait de leurs engagements.

Comme Susan Bro, la mère de Heather, nous sommes fières des combats de nos enfants.

Nous savons qu’ils payent ou risquent de payer très cher leur refus de la société injuste qui leur est imposée par les puissants. Mort, violences, condamnations judiciaires, emprisonnement… Ils connaissent tout cela. Nous le vivons avec eux.

Et nous affirmons du plus haut et du plus fort que nous pouvons que nos enfants ont raison, mille fois raison de lutter !

Notre combat à nous, leurs mères, c’est d’attirer l’attention sur leur parole trop souvent négligée, déformée ou caricaturée. La lutte contre la vision du monde véhiculée par l’extrême droite doit être l’affaire de toutes les générations, chacune à sa façon.

Des mères italiennes, des mères espagnoles, dont les parents ont connu le fascisme et le franquisme, nous ont montré le chemin. Parce qu’elles sont mères, elles sont écoutées.

Avec elles, nous sommes en train de constituer un Réseau international des Mères antifascistes afin de nous soutenir mutuellement et d’être présentes sur les lieux des luttes, que ce soient les luttes quotidiennes dans les quartiers racisés, dans les écoles, dans les prisons ; ou les luttes que le monde entier observera, comme celle d’aujourd’hui, 11 août 2018, à Charlottesville.

Nous sommes heureuses de nous associer à ce grand mouvement de résistance auquel votre courage nous appelle. Merci à vous.

Les Mères solidaires.