454- The Un-Women's History MonthS

Note on the image : i used a creative commons images, altered its colors/hue, reduced contrast and blurred/smudged words and objects, to further illustrate my subject. 

Brace yourselves for 1,356 words / 8,200 characters entry below, with a few trigger warnings, due to the topic at hand. Evidently, I couldn't discuss everything in details, just to brush over important examples. 

I came up with this title and topic last year, but somehow got delayed and self-censored, not wanting to rock any boat, but a whole further year elapsed and this SHIT needs addressing...

So, why do I use this title in March, Women's History Month ? Because, just like every year that I see parts of the world 'celebrating women', I also see the hypocrisies politicians, law enforcement, and people at large, exhibit on day-to-day basis, and especially during this particular Month, made to raise awareness as to multiple social diseases that are inflicted upon women, in no particular order and not limited to : 

• Education, language, culture,
• Inequalities in job accessibility and equal paychecks for equal jobs,
• Societal role expectations, 
• Clothing and sexualization,
• Body autonomy 
• Violence and crime, born from misogyny and borne in societies

In short, intersectional issues that patriarchy has created, that societies have perpetuated, to this very day. 

I want to point out a very important aspect of intersectionality that some feminists, even women feminists, forget or deny : Trans women are women. 

Indeed, every day there are girls who don't have proper access to education, thus limiting everything else ; there are baby girls who get murdered, because their parents (usually fathers, or women with internal misogyny) wanted boys... 

There are so many inequalities in the job-world, despite some progress : women can work in most countries, and yet... their access to higher positions are curtailed by men (suffice to research how many men and woman are in top ladders of any company, the numbers are staggeringly and frighteningly one-sided to all higher positions) ; women tend to be paid less for equal job description and seniority... 

Women are seen as selfish when they want to put forth their career instead of the societal expectation of getting married, popping, nursing and raising children, doing all the food shopping and cleaning in the house, whilst men 'win the household bread at the sweat of their forehead'... Men who put their career ahead of family are heroes and role models... Such double standards must end. 

Women's attire are either 'praised' in a sexually harassing way, and/or used in victim shaming and blaming ('oh, what were you wearing when .... ?'), and/or told dress codes, because they distract the men - or, in a way, far worse, when girls are told the same, about boys, in school, when no one has even had sexual awakening of the hormones... 

A really sad example is when a woman artist shows her next and poses next to it, in a comfortable, home attire. So many men leer and sexually harass, "distracted" by her appearance and attire...

Some men, and even women (again, with internal misogyny) criticize these women artist's attire for being "too sexy"  or "too revealing" and "distracting" from the art... I have one particular artist in mind, who keeps getting these comments, but have seen them before. This particular artist even got comments to the effect of "oh, if I can't compliment you, I'll stop looking at your art'', showing their true motives in so-called compliments : they want to first sexualize, and hide it in supposed praise... 

Women's rights for body autonomy are most often curtailed and infringed upon in societies where religion is too mixed into politics, and thus, instead of bringing positive change to its population, reduces their rights : women's rights and access to legal, affordable and less risks for abortion are systematically threatened and taken away in most Judeo-Christian countries, and non existent in others... 

Women's choice of attire may have evolved, in limited ways in specific countries - there were times women weren't supposed to wear pants/trousers, and other so-called men's attire, but the truth is far from a gained achievement : in the examples above, I already illustrated how women can be both praised/sexually harassed and victimized for her choice of garments. But this issue extends far beyond those sole examples. 

Violence and crime, are indeed born from misogyny and carry heavy loads of violence, crimes and murders perpetrated towards women. During the pandemic, we could see how domestic violence rates increased, as if there was no other tool to express frustration over isolation and social distancing... (news flash, there is never any reason and justification to any violent acts or words, no matter how frustrated or stir-crazy you are). 

I still remember and am still just as shocked about some of 2021 events... examples of police forces catching, beating and dragging women, in what should have been peaceful protests... 

There have been and still are policemen who discuss women among themselves and in online groups in very derogatory and sexualizing ways, and others (some of the same) who abuse, assault, rape and murder women. When police is part of the problem, instead of being there to protect everyone equally, there's really a huge societal cancer, in urgent need of some kind of surgery : in my opinion, the same one that most societies need, the death of patriarchy, and holding everyone accountable for words and actions alike. We cannot keep saying 'but to each their own' or 'well, I don't know what the limit should be' or 'but I was drunk' nor 'but I was provoked'... Enough is enough, police forces AND societies need major reboots. 

Instead of saying 'happy women's day/month' say and act towards closing the gaps of inequalities, say and act towards compassion and reduction of violence - aiming for their total and utter disappearance. Say and act to raise awareness and hold yourself and others accountable. 

If 'not all men' are like that, then SHOW IT, don't just say it and exclaim during women's history month that 'but I'm not like that' and 'not all men', WE all know this... what we, as a society, need, is to stop empty words and complaints, but durable actions, political decisions, and everything we can imagine and use, to work towards ending these societal diseases. When men and women put one another down, or act so inhumanly, we hurt as people, no matter what gender and nation we are from. We hurt, because we're all supposed to be sharing the same damn space on this tiny rock, aka the planet Earth, in a tiny little corner of the Universe as we know it...

And when I said earlier that TRANS WOMEN ARE WOMEN, I aim at terfs, supposedly feminists, who forget the main goals of feminism : more inclusion, intersectionality, and equality. If you're a terf, you're not a true, modern, intersectional feminist. You're a biggot who wants equality for a limited population : women as defined by you. 

And since JKR is spewing her hate, along other women and men, supposedly educated and open-minded, no, you're not as much as you say you are, you pick and choose the cherries, and throw away the cake! Please stop using your own trauma as an exclusion to the various traumas only Trans people experience, starting with your prejudice towards them, your exclusion of them in your terminologies and political aims. 

Because JKR is trending with her actions and words, other terfs joining her stands, and sexist, misogynist men, women and everyone else, who perpetuate inequality, continue bigotry, violence and crimes towards women, there cannot be any 'happy women's history month' nor 'IWD', simply because raising awareness has been far from enough to assuage these societal ills - especially during the ONE month of the year EVERYONE's supposed to take part, celebrate and lift the women - all women - in our lives and around us. This is why I chose this entry's title and to rant in this long post.

When will things REALLY CHANGE ? Will have the opportunity to see it positively happening in our lifetime ? Only the future shall show, as societies act towards correcting injustices and so-called oversights.

A last point I want to address : if we call it 'women's history month', it's all high-time for all to lift and empower, to remind everyone about all the women who have been erased in men's history recollections... But elaborating on this topic and naming names would make this entry far too long - I might, perhaps, possiblymaybe, make another, for examples.