From Hollywood to Farmworkers, We're with Women!

As we celebrate International Women’s Day and reflect on what a truly internationalist antimilitarist movement looks like, WRL lifts up the demands from the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, calling for an end to sexual and labor exploitation in the fields.

To struggle for the end of war and militarism is to struggle for the end of all violence- including the sexual violence experienced by 4 out of 5 women working on farms. In 2011, the CIW launched the Fair Food Program,which builds accountability for multinational food corporations and prevents the exploitation of farm workers' bodies and labor. While many companies joined the program to respond to consumer pressure, Wendy’s still has not. Instead, Wendy's moved its produce supplier to Mexico where sexual and labor exploitation are endemic. While Wendy's shareholders get to keep their pretty pennies, Black and Brown farmworkers pay the price.

That’s not right. As women across Hollywood say #MeToo, we find the voices of the most marginalized women muffled. From Hollywood to our farmlands, we must hold those in power accountable for the human rights abuses that all women and femmes endure to put food on all of our tables. That’s why WRL stands with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers' Freedom Fast: #TimesUpWendys campaign urging the multibillion-dollar fast-food company to join the Fair Food Program and ensure partnering farms offer fair pay and a culture of safety for women and survivors of sexual violence. This program sets a precedent for food companies everywhere, making it known that farmworkers and their allies are watching, and reminds workers from farms to factories that when we organize, we win!