In 1872, the president of Ecuador ordered that Manuela Leon be shot, after her leading role in an indigenous rebellion against forced labour. Her troops had been victorious, and they say she had managed to kill the lieutenant Miguel Vallejo.
In the president’s decree, he called her Manuel. And just like that, he erased the leading role of a woman from history.
Women, indigenous peoples, resistance fighters, the poor, and others, have been systematically deleted and conveniently overlooked in the history books. We’re brought up to believe that all the presidents, writers, inventors, and fighters just happened to be rich, white, men. But there was nothing accidental about it.
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