It's International Women's Day '09!

March 8th is International Women's Day!

According to the IWD website, IWD is a global day celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future.

IWD is a national holiday in:China, Armenia, Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Vietnam. SOMEBODY, or some bodies (!), had a clue in those countries! :-)

Not here. Not yet, anyway. The USA has no official holiday celebrating great women in herstory. March by the way, is Women's History Month, in case you didn't know.

We have holidays here in the USA to commemorate great men: George Washington, Abe Lincoln, and Martin Luther King, Jr. But no women!

Why?

Some might say, well, there's Mother's Day. That is important: I certainly respect mothers because I feel they are most often the glue that holds a family together, and they do SO much for so little in return. I tend to gravitate toward mom-like women and friends. They bring help bring life into the world and are the primary caretakers as we grow up. I know I could not have thrived without my mom's love and nuturing. :-)

But Mother's Day is not a paid, federal holiday. Perhaps people already feel we have the day off anyway, as Mother's Day falls on a Sunday.

What about all the other women--women who are not mothers, by choice or circumstance or whatever? Are we less worthy as women--as human beings, if we have not brought life into the world? Surely NOT! %-0

How about women who have made and continue to make great contributions to society: scientists, educators, environmentalists, physicians, nurses, community leaders, spiritual leaders, artists, writers, musicians, and activists who work hard to bring awareness of social injustices and improvements to ameliorate the suffering of others, just to name a few? The underpaid, overworked, and sometimes abused domestic workers? The many women tucked away and forgotten in nursing homes across the country? .

Who would I offer up as a candidate or two or more for the nation to celebrate and commemorate--worthy of having the country take a day off (and be paid!) in her honor?

I can think of some:

• Harriet Tubman: (c. 1820–1913) African-American abolitionist, humanitarian, and Union spy during the American Civil War.
• Eleanor Roosevelt: (1884-1962) First Lady of the US (1933-45), civil rights advocate, internationally prominent author, speaker, politician, and activist for the New Deal coalition.
• Jane Addams: (1860-1935) founder of the U.S. Settlement House Nobel Peace Prize and one of the first American women to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
• Rosa Parks: (1913-2005) African American civil rights activist whom the U.S. Congress later called "Mother of the Modern-Day Civil Rights Movement".
• Susan B. Anthony: (1820-1906) prominent American civil rights leader who played a pivotal role in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States.

That's just a start. I know there's many more. The lifelong work of those women alone are worthy of historical note alone. It's HERstory!


Imagine this: national holiday to commemorate a prominent woman (or more) AND a national holiday to celebrate International Women's Day!! Wouldn't that be fabulous? :-D

I'm not going to hold my breath on that one. :-(

Sure, most people know women make up half the population, but they sure don't appreciate that fact via apathy toward violence against women, unequal pay for equal work, and myriad of other woman-unfriendly facts of life.

But I can still hope. Hope that the misogynists of the world--in particular, the religious ones who would keep girls and women brainless and backward, would realize that their hateful, narrow, controlling view of women is only keeping humanity from moving forward.


As long as there are injustices committed against women both here and abroad, and as long as I am alive and breathing, I will continue to stand up for women's rights. Women's rights are human rights. Period.

I want to live in a progressive world, not a regressive one!



Hope is that thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops... at all.

~Emily Dickinson, (1830-1886) American poet