Why I Fight
Written by Xiomara Rivas, Photos by Morena Pérez Joachin
Guatemala City, Guatemala
November 21, 2020
I went to the protest against my family’s advice. My mother raised me during an armed conflict and she knows what it means to lose loved ones because they spoke out, but she also knows me. She understands why I have to participate in these protests, like I did in 2015 to fight against the corruption of President Otto Perez Molina.
She knows why I fight.
I fight for the sex worker who was continuously raped by a police officer, getting pregnant twice. She tried to flee but he was using police resources, human and monetary, to track her down.
I fight for the daughter of a judge who was abducted, raped and abused because her mother convicted corrupt narco-politicians.
I fight for a former student whose mother solder her at 12-years-old to work as a prostitute. She now lives in a drug-induced cloud, sniffing industrial glue to avoid reality.
I fight for the girl who died of starvation in her father’s arms.
I fight for the 41 girls who were burned alive in a state facility when they complained about human rights violations; for the girls and women who have to flee the country because they have no other choice, only to end up in a cage in another country, alone, scared and uncomprehending.
For them, I can take the sting of tear gas, I can take the risk of being incarcerated, I can take the physical pain, if only we can change this system once and for all. Re-build it for the betterment of our girls, our people, our country. Then it would all be worthwhile.
That is why I fight.
