McDonald鈥檚 workers in 10 cities across the United States walked off the job on September 18 to demand an end to sexual harassment in the workplace.
In Chicago, workers and their supporters marched to the McDonald鈥檚 headquarters, carrying a banner that read 鈥#MeToo McDonald鈥檚鈥 Many wore tape with 鈥淢eToo鈥 written on it covering their mouths.
They chanted, 鈥淲e鈥檙e here, we鈥檙e loud. Sexual harassment is not allowed鈥 and 鈥淩espect us! Accept us! Don鈥檛 try to touch us!鈥
鈥淭oday, fast-food workers just like me are breaking the silence, we鈥檙e taking the historic step and we鈥檙e going on strike to tell McDonald鈥檚 no more sexual harassment,鈥 McDonald鈥檚 worker Adriana Alvarez told the crowd.
Workers also joined actions at McDonald鈥檚 locations in Durham, North Carolina; Kansas City; Los Angeles; Miami; Milwaukee; New Orleans; Orlando, Florida; San Francisco and St Louis.
This is the first coordinated public action in what has been mostly an online campaign and legal battle. In 2016, the Fight for 15 published reports of widespread sexual harassment in the fast-food industry.
In May, 10 complaints from workers in eight different cities were filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) against McDonald鈥檚 regarding reports of on-the-job sexual harassment.
Last month, women鈥檚 committees formed by employees at dozens of McDonald鈥檚 restaurants announced that they had approved a walkout. Lead organisers include several women who filed the EEOC complaints in May. Hundreds of workers took part in the committee meetings.
As the Fight for 15 campaign exposed, women at fast-food restaurants experience sexual harassment 60% more than women in other workplaces. Four out of 10 fast-food workers face sexual harassment on the job. Workers involved in the campaign reported their exposure to groping, verbal and physical abuse, and even rape.
Many of the workers鈥 complaints to local management and franchise owners were ignored. When perpetrators received no reprimands or discipline, workers sought to change their situation by requesting different hours or store location changes.
Some workers even faced victim-blaming and retaliation for reporting the harassment and abuse. As in most cases, many claims of sexual harassment go unreported out of workers鈥 fear of losing their jobs.
McDonald鈥檚, like other multibillion-dollar fast-food corporations, attempts to cover up its anti-worker policies with propaganda about how it cares about its workers, or it attempts to distance the corporation from practices of the franchises鈥 ownership and management. It has produced a 聽available through a help line.
But when McDonald鈥檚 announced it was celebrating International Women鈥檚 Day this year to highlight its 鈥渃ommitment鈥 to women鈥檚 lives, it聽聽its need to provide fair working conditions and wages.
, the EEOC received more than 90,000 workplace complaints in 2016, with about one-third of those complaints related to harassment charges. Half of the harassment complaints involved sex-based harassment, with the largest number of claims in the food services industry.
The protests against sexual harassment at McDonald鈥檚 were boosted by the explosion of the #MeToo movement. They were also anchored by the ongoing struggle against income inequality started by the Fight for 15 in 2012, when 200 fast-food workers walked off the job to demand $15 an hour and union rights in New York City.
The EEOC complaints filed against McDonald鈥檚 earlier this year were supported by the聽, a $21 million charity launched in January to support low-income workers who want to report sexual harassment.
It is not just McDonald鈥檚 workers fighting back in this way. In Chicago,聽聽for higher wages, health care benefits and protections from racism and sexual harassment.
Many of these workers also took the struggle to City Hall to win the聽聽ordinance to protect workers from sexual assault and harassment by requiring hotels to provide panic buttons to all housekeepers.
In California,聽. By marching from San Francisco to Sacramento, these workers hope to build support for Assembly Bill 2079, better known as the Janitor Survivor Empowerment Act. This requires employer-financed peer-to-peer training on how to prevent sexual violence, including self-defence classes.
By connecting the power of #MeToo to the Fight for 15, struggles like the McDonald鈥檚 strike this week are leading the way to take up the contradictions and inequality based in both exploitation and oppression.
[Abridged from US .]