BUTTERFLIES … THIS! THIS! THIS!

25 NOVEMBER DAY OF NON-VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN “The story of the Mirabal sisters – On 17 December 1999, through resolution 54/134, the General Assembly has declared 25 November the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women and invited governments, international organizations and NGOs to organize on that day activities designed to sensitize public opinion on the issue of violence against women. Since 1981, activists for the rights of women have marked 25 November as a day against violence. The date was chosen as the brutal murder in 1960 of the three Mirabal sisters, political activists in the Dominican Republic, on orders of Dominican ruler Rafael Trujillo (1930-1961). Patria, Minerva and Maria Teresa Mirabal were three women from Ojo de Agua, a place belonging to a small province of the Dominican Republic called Salcedo These women had the courage to fight for political freedom in his country, strongly opposed the tyrannies against a more railways that Latin America has had, that of Rafael Leonidas Trujillo.Attitude by which they were persecuted, imprisoned several times and finally brutally murdered on November 25, 1960 In honor of these brave sisters, every November 25th marks the International Day of No Violence Against Women. This was established at the First Latin American and Caribbean Feminist held in Bogota, Colombia in 1981. The Mirabal sisters are also known and represented as the “Butterflies” as this is the secret name of Minerva in clandestine political activities against the Trujillo tyranny. Years later, Pedro Mir (Dominican national poet) used this name in his poem “Amen of Butterflies” which expresses the tragedy was the murder of the three heroines. In this decade, the prominent Dominican-American writer Julia Alvarez called his novel based on the life of the Mirabal sisters, In the Time of the Butterflies.Publication that provides further representation of the Mirabal sisters as the Butterflies Cristian Vasquez Minerva – Maria Teresa – Patria Heroines of the struggle against Trujillo. Daughters of Mercedes Reyes Camilo (aka Chea) and Enrique Mirabal, merchant and landowner. They were born in Ojo de Agua, Salcedo, common at the time of the Espaillat Province. The first birth was Patria Mercedes, 27 February 1924, shortly before they left our country intervening U.S. troops, the second was christened with the names of Maria Argentina Minerva, was born on 13 March 1926, and the third, Antonia Maria Theresa, came into the world October 15, 1935 In Ojo de Agua made his first studies. Later, in 1938, Patria, Minerva and one of his sisters still living, Belgium Adela, aka Dede (2 March 1925) were sent to study at Immaculate Conception High School in La Vega.Maria Teresa stayed at home for reasons of age: he was just three years Of the four sisters, Minerva, as manifested by those who knew him from childhood, he demonstrated that came into the world with a prodigious intellect and a remarkable spiritual sensitivity, these factors that made it a very attractive person, and a devourer of books literature and poetry.