International Women’s Day: Hard-won struggles and victories

International Women’s Day (IWD) is a global event celebrated annually on March 8 and is widely regarded as a focal point for women’s rights movements.

A bit of history: After the Socialist Party of America held a Women’s Day in New York in February 1909, delegates to the International Conference of Socialist Women the following year proposed that a “special Women’s Day” be held each year. When women in Soviet Russia were allowed to vote in 1917, March 8 became a national holiday. The day was primarily celebrated by communist countries until it was adopted by the feminist movement around 1967. The UN began observing the day in 1977. Today, among the countries that celebrate International Women’s Day, some mark the day with protests, while others celebrate womanhood, and still others do both—or more.

We’ve come a long way, baby

While leafing through a stack of old magazines that belonged to someone in my parents’ circle of friends when I was a kid, I came across the phrase “You’ve Come A Long Way, Baby.” It was a 1968 advertising slogan for a brand of cigarettes known as Virginia Slims. The company famously held up the product as a symbol of women’s empowerment. Fifty-three years later, a lot has changed: Cigarette advertising is banned from radio and television, and a woman of color, Kamala Harris, has won the vice presidency for the first time in American history.

In a fascinating continuation of women’s progress anchored by a catchy slogan, Loretta Lynn released her hit country single “We’ve Come a Long Way Baby” in 1978, which gently aimed to challenge the idea that women were the “weaker sex.” “Well, I don’t want a wall to paint, but I’ll have my say,” she sings. “From now on, my lover, it’s fifty-fifty, all the way. Up until now, I’ve been an object made to please you. Times have changed and I demand to be pleased too.”

Concrete challenges, tangible progress

Recent decades have seen major progress for women around the world, in terms of literacy, life expectancy and wages, but huge disparities remain, particularly in majority world (i.e. “developing”) countries. And Covid has only further highlighted these disparities, with the majority of frontline workers both women and underpaid.

But let’s be real. Pandemic or not, when it comes to talking about the progress women have made over the past 100, 50, or even 20 years, a variety of crucial factors come into play: race, class, and nationality, for starters. For example, women in Saudi Arabia only got the right to drive in 2018, and Loujain al-HathloulThe activist who made it possible was kidnapped, detained and tortured, only to be released earlier this month. Iran’s compulsory veiling laws require women and girls as young as seven to cover their hair with a headscarf. Women who refuse are arrested and even torturedIn Poland, women are currently taking to the streets to protest the latest move by a right-wing religious conservative government to ban abortion in all cases except rape. And to those who think that women in North America have a better situation than women elsewhere, I say: “Different struggles, but struggles nonetheless.” One only has to look at the terribly precarious state of the Abortion Rights in the United Statesthe epidemic of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women in Canada, or in progress pay gap to understand that there is still much to do to fight.

But I don’t want to be a killjoy: while IWD is about fighting for justice, it is also about creating a sense of celebration for all of women’s victories. to have earned over the years.

Vote. THE legal right Women’s suffrage was established in the United States over the course of more than fifty years, first in various States and localities, and then nationally in 1920, although Native Americans did not gain the right to vote until the 1960s. In Canada, women had largely gained the right to vote by 1918, with the exception of Quebec, where women were not able to vote until 1940. First Nations people gained the right to vote in 1960.

Contraception. In 1960, the FDA approved the world’s first commercially available birth control pill, allowing women to decide when and if they want children. *(translation: HUGE). In recent years, however, women have made huge strides as we have begun to have access to a plethora of other contraceptive options which are much less harmful to the body than hormonal contraceptives.

Reproductive rights. In 1973, during his historic 7-2 Roe v. Wade decision, the Supreme Court of the United States stated that a woman’s legal right to an abortion is protected by the Constitution. Many states have set limits on these rights, but the RvW decision remains a key precedent!

Equal pay. In 1963, p.Kennedy Resident signed on Equal Pay Actprohibiting gender-based pay discrimination between men and women doing the same work in the same workplace. This law is limited and not always enforced, but it is on the books, making it a potentially valuable tool in ongoing struggles for equality.

Civil rights. In 1964, the president Johnson signed on Civil Rights Actwhich prohibits discrimination in employment based on race, religion, national origin, or sex. If 2020 has taught us anything, it’s that racism is alive and well in America today (even in feminist circles), but again, having these things on paper always helps, and it certainly added to the crucial momentum of the day.

Partisan politics. In 1968, Shirley Chisholm became the first black woman elected to the U.S. Congress. In 1993, Janet Reno was sworn in as the first female attorney general. In 1997, Madeleine Albright became the first female Secretary of State. In 2007, Nancy Pelosi became the first female Speaker of the House. In 2016, Hillary Clinton became the first woman to receive a presidential nomination from a major political party. In January 2021, Kamala Harris became the first woman (as well as the first Black woman and the first person of Southeast Asian descent) to win the vice presidency.

Porn. Feminist porn has been around since the 1980s, when former porn stars Candida Royalle And Annie Sprinkle The two women decided to make their own films, from a woman’s perspective and for a female audience. Initially dismissed by adult film executives as “unsellable,” their first video garnered huge interest from women and couples. With the advent of the internet at the turn of the millennium, feminist porn took off. The first paid porn site for women, Purve, launched in 1998. Fast forward to 2017, when beauty Enter the scene, and the rest, my darlings, is history.

While a brief, U.S.-centric list like this hardly does justice to the wildly varied ongoing struggles and hard-won victories of women around the world, a overview of the state of the global gender gap can help create a more complete picture.

This is international women’s liberation, you know, the meaningful kind.

A love in 2021! <3