User:Чиодица Перковић/sandbox

Vigils on Wednesday was the continuous anti-war protest held in Belgrade, organized by an anti-militarist peace feminist organization from Belgrade Women in Black, against the wars in the former Yugoslavia.

Following the example of the Women in Black from Israel, the organization from Belgrade held protests against the war once a week, every Wednesday, during the entire duration of the armed operations from 1991. until 1995. During this time the state of war was never declared in Serbia and the homogenization of the nation was taking place. In this atmosphere, this street action was met with support from only a small part of the public, and mostly hostility and condemnation for "betrayal of the nation".

The uniqueness of the protest of the anti-war group Women in Black, the way it was started by women in Israel and accepted by women in Serbia and around the world, is in the performative expression of a political statement about the war – widows' blacks clothes, standing still, and silence. With this aesthetics they brought the traditional position of women in patriarchy, who mourn for deceased relatives in private to the public sphere. Their political dissidence was set as a universal principal that condemns war, and mourns for all human victims, regardles of  kinship, gender, nation, religion, etc.