Welcome to the National Handmaids' Day of Action

Welcome to the National Handmaids' Day of Action

by Carrie

The Handmaids of Minnesota welcome you and thank you for joining us today for the National Handmaids' Day of Action.   It is encouraging to see so many of you here standing up to this administration and to the cruelties that have occurred because of them. 

Look at the sea of red before you.   Red has many attributes attached to the color.  Margaret Atwood utilized these words in her famous banned book, The Handmaids Tale, “Everything except the wings around my face is red: the color of blood which defines us. The white wings too are prescribed issue, they are to keep us from seeing, but also from being seen.”

The Handmaids of Minnesota understand the symbolism of oppression and the imagery of red in Atwood’s novel and use it as our platform.  We stand here today with a unified message. 

We, all of us, are witnesses to the events occurring in our country and of the weakening of our democracy.    We are using our voices, and we are demanding RED:

R for the Rule of law. 

E for Equal protection

D for Due Process.

This administration has defied and ignored the Rule of Law.  They have taken the courts and made them into political pawns, twisting them for their own use and for the abuse of the people of this nation.   This administration attempts to take our voice away as well as our constitutional freedoms, the protection to stand here today for what we believe in and for what we know is right.   The Handmaids of Minnesota utilize our red masks as a visual representation of this silencing and the erosion of this fundamental right.

Equal protections are being stripped away.  Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion are being systemically removed from government websites, agencies, and higher education.   Our LGBTQIA brothers and sisters, particularly those in the trans community are being targeted and persecuted.    Voting rights are being threatened, voting maps are being redrawn impacting marginalized communities.  A woman’s right to determine what is best for herself and her body is being removed.  The Handmaids of Minnesota stand with these communities, our mothers, sisters, fathers, brothers, spouses, friends, and neighbors.  

Due process, the fundamental legal right in this country is being denied; as evident by the brutalities of ICE officers who are profiling undocumented immigrants.  We have seen the video footage and the reports of the ICE “blitz” occurring in Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago.  Images of people being pulled from their homes, vehicles, and workplaces, being torn from their families by masked men without Judicial warrants and with lack of access to legal representation.   The Handmaids of Minnesota are committed in demanding accountability of the Department of Homeland Security and the exposure of these injustices.

We demand RED be placed back into our government!

We demand the Rule of Law!

We demand Equal protections!

We demand Due Process!

We ask that you stand with us and use your voices to demand the same.