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What is not relevant is fun-packed dancing from around the world, spice workshops and fashion shows. Fashion is to international women's rights as Agassi kitchen utensils are to gay rights. Yes, some women are interested in fashion; some gay men own more than one brightly coloured fish slice. But it is an outrage against people who take liberties seriously - who embody the core of feminism by interpreting it as a war that hasn't been won until it's been won for all women - to trivialise these matters.

It could not matter less if yoga is good for you, or women have a connection with the moon, or there's some very interesting storytelling going on in Ayr. What matters enormously is the impact on the enterprise as a whole when it expands to cover animals in art. It's this kind of hijacking of meaningful collective action that did for the women's movement in the first place, that made today's young women think you could believe in equal pay as a regular person, but as soon as you called yourself a feminist you had to stop shaving your legs and start eating pulses. Tell stories and dance as much as you will - but not on International Women's Day. Make your own day of celebrations. Call it Gullible Idiots Unite. Have it in April.

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However, thought about in conjunction with this article from Canadian Dimensions, one wonders, if there was a direct move to marginalize women who are speaking of equality issues, on this day?

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This is a government that doesn’t think women, especially feminists, are a constituency it needs to listen to or worry about. The Harper Conservatives simply aren’t paying much attention to women or to other equality-seeking groups such as gays and lesbians, Aboriginal people, or childcare advocates. In short, the attack on Status of Women is part of the same ideological hostility that led to the elimination of the budget for the Law Reform Commission of Canada (which did first-rate research on legal, political and constitutional matters, and published and distributed these for free for citizen use), and for the Court Challenges Program (which funds cases that have important questions of law and which might not otherwise be taken before the courts).

In effect, any group seeking to challenge the status quo or guide the government towards more proactive, progressive policies has been pegged as “against us” rather than “with us,” and the Conservatives are disarming and dismantling them as fast as they can.

Status of Women is now prohibited from funding work that can be considered “political advocacy.” That’s rich. The Conservatives will consent to funding shelters for battered women, but not organizations advocating for an end to violence against women and children. We can bind the wounds but not question the structures and processes that wound in the first place.

While particular communities will be injured by the Harper government¹s actions, it is ultimately democracy itself that is hurt, as groups with the tenacity to lobby for “equality” are pushed to the margins; as grassroots sources of information dry up; as citizen involvement in the political order is frustrated; and as public policy is churned out uncomplicated by input from the people it actually affects.

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They had a video of Toronto Central Tech around 1920 and what happens on a daily basis there, and of course pictures of the guys hard at work at math, then in the gym working out. And then the women and I'll try to quote the words on the screen directly "Here are the Ladies learning how to keep money in their hubbies pockets by learning to sew their own dresses" and then they went on to show them cooking, baking, sewing, hat making, anything but actual acedemics.

Not entirely relevant, but there has been a marked imprevement by a lot of society in our views towards women, it's just unfortunate that the corporate power seem to think that International Womens Day should mean that it's 1/2 price martini's until 8.

Personally, I think woman are a very valuable addition to our society and almost entirely important to the survival of humanity.

[ 08 March 2007: Message edited by: quelar ]

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The progress of Cuban women within Cuba's social revolutionary project is beyond question. Cuba makes it a priority to incorporate women into high levels of active work and insure they are able to develop and use their abilities. A special function of the Labor and Social Security Ministry is to offer women administrative responsibilities and guarantee them adequate conditions for work.

Women in Cuba receive equal pay as men for the same jobs and enjoy recognized sexual and reproductive rights in very advanced legislation that protects them, universal and free health care and education systems, programs to promote their quality of life as well as their cultural and social advancement and special programs for maternity and child protection.

In addition to the traditional optional one year maternity leave at full pay, in August 2003 State Council Law No.234 came into effect. This is the legal instrument of the Family Code marriage contract: "to attend, care for, protect, educate, help, give profound affection to, and prepare for life" the fruit of their love, sworn to by both potential parents at the marriage ceremony, and a right and duty recognized equally for adoptive parents. The law protects both mothers and fathers who decide by mutual accord that they want to share the child-raising role after the breastfeeding period, without having to worry about irate bosses or job security.

Thus in Cuba, a mother or father can either opt to return to work or remain at home until the baby is one year old and can attend the very low cost daycare facilities. This law also covers up to a six month absence from work, without reprisal, for either parent should one of their children under 16 years of age become ill.

Such a law is important in a country where women are 66 percent of all technicians and professionals, 62 percent of university graduates, more than 44 percent of the work force in the state-civil sector, 36 percent of the members of Congress, and more than 33 percent of all people on management levels are female.

For more impressive statistics: 18 percent of the heads of Cuban Ministries are women, 22.7 percent of assistant ministers, 61 percent of Cuba's attorneys are women, 49 percent of its judges and 47 percent of Supreme Court justices.

All receive equal pay for equal work and position.

Access to education and health services, including sexual and reproductive health, is universal and free. Abortion is free on demand. Women's life expectancy in the Cuban archipelago is 78 years, maternal mortality is 33.9 percent per 100,000 live births and infant mortality is below 6 percent per 1000 live births (the lowest in Latin America and below many sectors of the United States).

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Being a feminist in this era of Girls Gone Wild and cell phone porn downloading can be seriously disheartening at times. To make matters worse, there is the spectre of Stephen Harper lusting after a majority government, with the help of his closest female advisers, R.E.A.L. Women, a right-wing anti-women think tank, who are proud of their motto: “women's rights, but not at the expense of human rights.”

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