They are protesters, but also mothers and wives, daughters and sisters. For many in Armenia’s patriarchal society, their gender makes their protest unacceptable.

Some critics respond with ridicule. Others question their femininity. Still others, like the police officer photographed kissing the neck of a detained female protester, respond with physical abuse.

Yet these women keep on protesting.

A roughly two-month-long protest in 2012 over the construction of kiosks in Yerevan’s Mashtots Park was one of the first demonstrations in which noticeable numbers of Armenian women actively participated, observers say. The trend has continued.

Women were among those who gave Yerevan residents free rides during a 2013 protest against a 50-percent increase in public-transportation fares. They also took part in the nearly three-month-long “Electric Yerevan” in 2015, when demonstrations against higher power prices forced government concessions and challenged Armenia’s friendship with Russia. A year later, when gunmen took over a Yerevan police station, many women again took to the streets to support their armed uprising against the government.

But as women’s presence at protests has increased over the past decade, so, too, has their exposure to police brutality against demonstrators, comments Janna Alexanyan, chairperson of Journalists for Human Rights, a Yerevan-based non-governmental organization.

Exactly how frequently is unknown. The Special Investigation Service, which provides information about criminal cases, claims that no criminal charges have been filed against the police for violence against women.

The Armenian prosecutor’s office does not have number of official complaints filed in 2016, though Alexanyan estimates the tally at 100.

Yet, like their male counterparts, many women protesters who have endured police brutality often opt not to file official complaints. The thinking is that it’s a waste of time.

While the ombudsperson’s office has discussed with law enforcement an unspecified number of cases of alleged police violence against women, it has no results to show. The national police does not maintain statistics on the sex of victims of brutal crimes.

In the past, however, they have sought to dodge some accusations.

Earlier this year, several mothers of soldiers killed off-duty claimed that police spat at them and treated them roughly when they staged a protest outside of President Serzh Sargsyan’s administration building to demand an investigation.