Happy International women's day?

Hi everyone,

Today is the International Women's Day, as you probably already know. Yesterday happened something that made me a little concerned. I wished "happy international women's day" to a friend and she seemed a little uncomfortable. Wondering why, I began to study about this date.

A happy day?

It seems not. The International Women's Day was a hard and conflicting date right from the start. It began after the protests made by Russian female workers in 1920, in pursue of better labor conditions. It was revived in 1960, after an hiatus of quite some time. Some find offensive how the date, then, became a sort of "Valentine's Day", being explored commercially, including by the employers themselves that only acknowledge the date with an insignificant sign or gift, instead of better labor conditions as, ironically, was the original motivation.

It seems my friend had her reasons to react like that.

A call to arms

The women indeed have reasons to fight yet. The working conditions are still unequal, as many researches show (including this one). The women continue to be paid less then men, when performing similar functions. Also women around the world keep being discriminated and maltreated. India, for instance, has an undeclared permissive trace of rape in its culture, making this crime there sort of accepted. In Brazil, the raping is often justified as if the victim were partially responsible for it due to the way she dressed or behaved. In some countries still nowadays, women don't have all the rights or aren't considered full citizens. The women still struggle to be, after all.

Finally...

So, the date is important indeed. It is those dates that serve to remind us. Remind that we still have a lot to do for a cause. But, I consider, it doesn't need to be only about fighting. We also may use this date to praise the women, show how we care for them. What we can't do is use these demonstrations of affection as substitution of more important changes that must be done. It may be a happy day after all, but, above all, it is a day for reflection.

Best wishes to you all and, specially, for you dear women!