International Womens’ Day (by sarah)
It's International Womens' Day and I sort of didn't make it to the festival in London nor meet up with friends or celebrate another's birthday or any of the other things we had planned due to homework and sick kids.
I'm kind of in two minds about this sort of thing - part of me wants to say it is not needed and is just highlighting the divide but then I look in the history books, and notice the names that are not there, the ones we did not learn about in school, and the pay gap in this country between men and women, and watch the news and see girls being stoned to death for having opinions and I think... yeah this is needed to highlight those things.
I've been grumpy with the feminism stuff lately - for a start for me it is the wrong word and in general words ending in isms cause schisms. But I'd always said I was a feminist then recently I've seen talks being shut down because there was no female speakers even though the speakers and bored, were not chosen as such but came from people putting themselves forward - the issue there is that the women need to feel empowered to put themselves forward and that needs to be pointed out but not in a way that results in the shutting down of the whole event - due to the main backer pulling out for fear of public backlash. It was a pointless waste.
But that was just a bit of over kill and I understood where it had come from. However now what I am seeing is something far more insipid and down right nasty. And that is a sort of, 'your not a woman or not a woman exactly like me therefore your opinion is not valid.'
I have seen this applied to men, people of different ethnic origins/religions and economic classes and sexualities and orientations. And it makes me sad, angry and sick - how dare you say someone can not have a voice because they are not the same as you - you can disagree and debate with them yes but not crush them beneath your heels for not conforming to what you think a woman or feminists should be. This is mostly women to other women.
This attitude has highlighted for me exactly why International Womens' Day is important still, the term woman covers just over half the human population and within that there is a beautiful range of diversity and natures and stories to explore, not to mention potentials to be fostered.
Rant over... for those of you still reading I have a little favour to ask...
For next year I wish to release a little e-book of poems about inspirational women but I don't want to just use the ones I can think of so if people could nominate in the comment fields below - maybe with a link to wikipeadia though just a name is fine - that would be fab!
I've done poems for various events around International Womens' Day before and just want to create a little collection.
Thankyou!
Events and Outings, Poems, Sarah, Society | sarah | 
Sat 8th Mar 2014 9:58 pm
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By John Cowan, Sun 9th Mar 2014 @ 12:35 am
"I myself have never been able to find out what feminism is; I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat or a prostitute." —Rebecca West
By sarah, Sun 9th Mar 2014 @ 9:52 am
😀 Thanks
By angie (mum), Sun 9th Mar 2014 @ 10:38 am
A not very well known lady called Mrs Patricia Jackson a teacher who nurtured and fed those of us who wanted to learn or vastly improve our level and expertise in clothesmaking and other crafts. All we wanted to know and more. I hope she qualifies.
By sarah, Sun 9th Mar 2014 @ 9:42 pm
If you give me more detail about her I can include her