About International Women's Day
March 8 is an international celebration that marks when women achieved the right to vote. While America was by no means the first country to give us equal voting rights, we did eventually catch up, and now both men and women alike can apathetically tweet at politicians, and actually go vote. The United Nations calls constitutional gender equality the unfinished business of our time, and continues to advocate for female voting rights in the remaining 52 countries where women are treated equal to house pets.
International Women’s Day has also expanded to represent other forms of gender equality and equal rights issues. However, like always, the backwards United States of America will by no means be front running any cultural movements where women are taken seriously en masse. We probably have to wait around for Russia to shame us into conforming, like we have to do with most things. See: moon landing, electric grids, radios, televisions, fake news.
Our monocratic ruler is the good old Boys Club, the normative rules of which most find too unsettling to speak out loud. Occasionally, the culture does crack, and issues like the #METOO movement bubble out of its fissures.
This is why I particularly loath this holiday. It reminds me that I — just like mothers, fathers, secretaries and dead presidents — am taking part in a thankless job that earns me a participatory hug one day each year. “Thank you for participating. We’ll talk again in 363 days, ma’am.”
Dear men: it is as annoying for us to have to talk about this stuff as it is for you to hear it. The fact that we are still complaining means that it is still very much an issue, and the people who can help us keep pretending not to hear us. It’s 2019. Women are here: feet touching the bed of the well. Looking up, begging for rope.
The theme of this year’s International Women’s Day is quite apropos to this existential crisis causing my grumpy mood. It’s all about recalibrating and seeking balance.
The United States Boys Club isn’t all so interested in giving up control, and that’s what’s causing the whole Corporate America/Entrepreneur America problem where women are simply not taken as seriously. The thing about balance, and power, is that there is a finite amount. One person has to let some go for the other to gain any. This is why women everywhere are posting #BalanceforBetter
Which is a lovely and politically correct way of saying what we actually mean:
Excuse me, Sir. I would like to create great stuff, be given respect for what I do instead of who I am, and then pee sitting down because I was born this way, and frankly, it is more comfortable and you know you like doing it too.
Make one decision in favor of a woman today and watch what happens. Then rinse and repeat tomorrow. You are welcome, in advance.
