Sunday 8th March is not any normal Sunday. Yes, the chances are your family’s roast dinner will still be served in all its gravy- sorry groovy – grandeur at the dining table. And yes, Countryfile will most definitely still be gracing your television screens with some lovely sheep and cows (on in the background of course, unless you like that sort of thing – hey, who am I to judge?). Nope, what I am really getting at is Sunday 8th March shines especially bright because it is the date that women all across the globe unite together for International Women’s Day 2015.
If you don’t know, International Women’s Day is a day of celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future. It was first recorded in 1911 in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland, with over one million men and women attending rallies for women’s civil rights. Today International Women’s Day is a day of celebration for women’s triumphs, a day of raising awareness for women’s struggles, and a day of hope for positive change in the future. In some places of the world International Women’s Day is even a National Holiday. Of course, here in the United Kingdom, good old David Cameron is yet to make the leap to make it one (I’m sure he has a lot of other pressing issues on his plate), but one thing is for sure: with or without a break from the nine-to-five, our immense purple-pride over this momentous day is as strong as ever.
To remember why, let’s cast our minds back to three of the most iconic moments and remarkable achievements of women in the past year.
- At eleven years old she was blogging anonymously for BBC about her life as a school girl in Swat Valley, Pakistan. Now Malala Yousafzai is a female activist against violence, poverty and for more access to education for women and girls. Most inspiring of all, in 2014 Malala became the youngest person ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize at the age of seventeen years old. Upon receiving the prestigious award, she said in her acceptance speech to the world: “I am those 66 million girls deprived of an education. And today I am not raising my voice, it is the voice of those 66 million girls”. Beyoncé may well be ‘Queen B’, but Malala is undoubtedly ‘Queen A’.
- Emma Sulkowicz, an Art student at Columbia University in New York, vowed to lug around her heavy mattress everywhere she went until her alleged rapist was expelled from the school. And lug she did. The protest originally started as an art project, yet went on to provoke a revolution against sexual assault. 28 mattresses were dropped outside the University President’s office. Now that is some revolution.
- If you haven’t heard, though no longer Hermione at Hogwarts, Emma Watson showed the world that she is still very much capable of magic with her speech at the UN conference in September 2014. Whether she is a famous film star or not, her message of Gender Equality and Feminism was heard loud and clear by men and women all over the globe. In the speech Emma passionately announced, “It is time that we all see gender as a spectrum instead of two sets of opposing ideals. We should stop defining each other by what we are not, and start defining ourselves by who we are”. Somehow I don’t think 10 points to Gryffindor will ever be enough.
There are seven billion people on planet Earth, half of those are women. Above are only three examples of millions of inspiring women making a change for a better future, and it all started over a hundred years ago with the Suffragettes. As for making a positive change to 2015, I suggest you start small and make your dear mum a cup of tea… and even your dad, if he fancies one. Heck, just make a round for your all your friends and the next door neighbour too.
Celebrate International Women’s Day with love on Sunday 8th March with #makeithappen. (Oh – and don’t to #makethetea).
