March 8 was International Women’s Day, marked since 1911. And all due respect and gratitude to those who shared, sent, posted messages of support for women on that day (many of whom support women’s rights every day), let me share a challenge.
Too many of these recognition days supplant real activism with platitudes and marketing campaigns. If you want to celebrate and uplift women, fight.
Fight to ensure that no woman is ever a victim of war, sexual violence, or partner violence again. The Russian attack on Ukraine offers the latest evidence of women’s bodies used as battlegrounds.
Fight to ensure that every woman and person who can get pregnant has legal protection of their full bodily autonomy, and access to a full range of skilled and compassionate health care.
Fight to ensure that every trans woman can walk openly in any community they choose to call their own, without fear of violence. That every trans athlete can compete in the sports they love.
Fight to ensure that no girl is raised with the belief that her worth is in her looks, or with the belief that her brain is unsuited to her passions, be they math, science, art, poetry, sport, business, or politics.
Fight to ensure that all girls, women, and the humans they love grow up with clean air and water, nutritious local food, and a sustainable environment.
Being a supporter of women is great. Fighting for women is better. Making society safer for women by definition makes it safer for all members of our human family.
Women’s rights are human rights.
Thank you for your company on this journey.