I struggle each year with this feeling that we, culturally have somewhat whitewashed the essence of International Women’s Day and turned it into a sweet little cookie cutter holiday, its not that I don’t loved the Strong women, may we know them, may we raise them, may we be them spirit of things its wonderful and its absolutely true and lovely to post, every day all year round its palatable, inoffensive and still making a point and we need that, but not today. Today if that’s all we post then we do not only ourselves but all women a disservice.
Today we aren’t here to hand out platitudes. Today is the one culturally recognised day society ‘allows’ us to really use our voices and not just to speak but to shout. Today is the day we fought for, to raise up the voices of the women of have had them stolen to remind those women that we see them, that we know their pain and that we will not EVER stop fighting for them especially when they cannot fight for themselves.
Today in every country of the world women non binary and trans people are subjugated, confronted by discrimination inequality and violence.
Today 153 countries have laws which discriminate against women.
1 in 3 women and girls experience violence or abuse.
380 million women and girls are living in poverty on less than $1.90 per day, forming the majority of those who do.
Women in Afghanistan have been banned from secondary education. 20 years of equality progress has been erased since the Taliban took over.
Women in Iran are being assaulted and have not only been forced to veil but have been forbidden from dancing or singing solo in public, riding a bicycle, attending matches in sports arenas, becoming judges or president. They must sit at the back of the bus and can travel abroad only with their husband’s permission.
In the USA 13 states have banned safe legal abortion meaning women residing in those states have fewer human rights protections than in authoritarian regimes such as Saudi Arabia.
12 million girls under 18 are married each year. South Sudan has some of the highest rates of forced marriage in the world with 45% of girls married before they turn 18 and 7% of that number before they turn 15. They also have the worlds 5th highest maternal mortality rate, 1 in 7 women will die due to pregnancy or childbirth.
Yemeni women cannot access healthcare without permission from their male guardian and do not have equal rights over their own children.
1 woman or girl is killed by someone in her own family every 11 minutes.
130 million girls remain out of school worldwide.
Women shoulder billions of hours of unpaid care.
Almost 1 in 4 women experience food insecurity.
It’s estimated it could take another 286 years to remove discriminatory laws for women and girls.
Women earn 77 cents for every dollar men do.
In Papua New Guinea its is culturally EXPECTED for a man to beat his wife, not surprisingly their womens prisons are filled with women who just couldn’t take it anymore.
At least 200 million women and girls aged 15 – 49 have undergone FGM
Its estimated that up to 50,000 women were raped during the Bosnian war, war rape is used globally as a weapon and method of systematic ethnic cleansing.
And I could go on and on and on but the truth is most of the people who started reading this wont have made it nearly this far so if you did thank you and well done.
What I will finish by saying is that today if you have the incredible privilege of being once of those women not effected please repost this or your own post, give your voice to the voiceless and remind the women that aren’t so lucky that they are not alone.
God Bless Lou X
Beautifully Defected 