50 (more) reasons we need International Women's Day
1 of 1 2 of 1
March 8 is International Women's Day, a celebration of women's achievements and a day wherein I reflect on how many hurdles women still face in society.
Last year I put together a list of 50 reasons we need the day; this year, I bring you 50 more.
- Because 17-year-old Retaeh Parsons hanged herself—and subsequently died—after being tormented in the wake of an alleged gang rape in 2011
- Because Christie Blatchford defended Parsons’ rapists
- Because one in five Canadians still believes drunk women are asking for it
- Because men are more likely to be sexually aggressive toward women if the woman is drunk
- Because the entire University of Ottawa men's hockey team was suspended over allegations that multiple members of the team raped a woman from Thunder Bay
- Because U of Ottawa student leader Anne-Marie Roy had to call out the rape culture on campus after receiving screenshots of a conversation between five men detailing how they’d like to sexually assault her
- Because of the rape chants at St. Mary’s University in Halifax
- Because of UBC’s rape chant
- Because there’s a man sexually assaulting women on UBC’s campus
- Because UBC’s serial sexual predator has been assaulting women since at least April 2013, but the public wasn’t warned until months later
- Because UBC’s serial sexual predator has yet to be caught
- Because “rape culture” is prevalent at many universities
- Because when you talk about “rape culture”, some people don’t believe it exists
- Because women are routinely harassed and assaulted on public transit in Vancouver, so much so that SFU students Alexa Dredge and Katie Nordgren set up a blog to record people’s experiences (Harassment on Transit blog)
- Because Avery Edison, a transgender woman from the U.K., was denied entry into Canada, detained in Toronto, and sent to a men’s prison
- Because 132 sexual assaults were reported in 2013, a 21 percent increase from 2012 (and remember: generally only one in 10 assaults is reported at all)
- Because pregnant women are still discriminated against in the workforce
- Because TED doesn’t want to talk about abortion
- Because there is still nowhere to obtain a surgical abortion in Prince Edward Island
- Because Saskatchewan ProLife and the Association for Reformed Political Actio) would like to bring parental consent regulations to Saskatchewan, requiring any female under the age of 18 seeking an abortion to get her parents’ approval before the procedure
- Because too many white feminists routinely lessen, negate, belittle, ignore, and erase the experiences of women of colour
- Because solidarity is for white women
- Because during a news scrum, Toronto mayor Rob Ford said he never wanted to eat former policy adviser Olivia Gondek's pussy and he has "more than enough to eat at home"
- Because after Trent Mays and Ma’lik Richmond were convicted of raping a 16-year-old girl in Steubenville, Ohio, the media rushed to defend them—for example, after the verdict was delivered, CNN correspondent Candy Crowley said, “Those poor boys’ lives are ruined.”
- Because Georgia Appeals Court Judge Christopher J. McFadden ordered a new trial for a convict rapist because the victim— a 24-year-old woman with Downs Syndrome—didn’t act enough like a victim
- Because of the GOP’s War on Women
- Because, despite Texas senator Wendy Davis’s successful 10-hour filibuster of a controversial omnibus bill that would severely restrict abortions and women’s access to them in that state, Governor Rick Perry called a special session of the senate so he could rubber stamp it anyway
- Because Texas Tribune editor-in-chief Evan Smith thought it was totally appropriate to ask Davis, who’s now running for governor of Texas, if she plans on playing the "gender card" in the race
- Because the last reproductive health clinic in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley had to close its doors last month
- Because activist Sarah Slamen was forcibly removed from the Texas Senate's Health and Human Services committee for criticizing anti-choice lawmakers
- Because Alaskan senator Fred Dyson thinks that low-income women are too cheap to buy birth control
- Because Bill O’Reilly and Michele Bachmann still don’t think women are qualified to be president.
- Because, during the Screen Actors Guild awards in February, a red carpet host asked Mayim Bialik how many people assumed she could “solve calculus” because she plays a scientist on The Big Bang Theory, oblivious of the fact that Bialik is also a neuroscientist
- Because advertisers still rely on hoary, outdated stereotyping to sell products to women—obviously we only use computers to plan our weddings, right Microsoft?
- Because leaning in is considered the epitome of feminist thought by too many people
- Because only 20 percent of computer programmers are women.
- Because women are less likely than men to have an employer-provided pension, and those pensions are generally worth less than those of a male employee
- Because Massachusetts’s Supreme Judicial Court just ruled that it’s absolutely legal to take upskirt photos of women
- Because the members of Pussy Riot were whipped by Cossack militia members during the Sochi Olympics
- Because former Pussy Riot members Nadya Tolokonnikova and Masha Alyokhina were again attacked on March 6 by a group of men in Nizhny Novgorod, one of whom carried a sign saying “Dirty whores out of our town”
- Because: pick-up artists
- Because: The Red Pill
- Because only 23 percent of Oscar voters are women
- Because exactly one woman, Kathryn Bigelow, has won an Oscar for Best Director, and only four women (including Bigelow) have even been nominated for the award
- Because of how many films utterly fail the Bechdel Test
- Because only 36 percent of newsroom staffers are women
- Because an online study conducted by the International Women’s Media Foundation and the International News Safety Institute found that 64 percent of female journalists have experienced “intimidation, threats, or abuse” in the office or in the field, and 46 percent reported they’ve been sexually harassed at work
- Because a man writing for the Columbia Journalism Review decried the results of the above study because it didn’t survey men, too
- Because when I search for stock images of “International Women’s Day”, I am bombarded with pink pictures of shoes, silhouettes of women dancing, cupcakes, flowers, and lipstick
- Because last year when I made this list I was told to take a Midol
Happy International Women's Day. If a woman, please don't get murdered. Too many are.
— Margaret E. Atwood (@MargaretAtwood) March 7, 2014
Comments
38 Comments
RUK
Mar 7, 2014 at 2:22pm
Good post.
Cue the haters. "That's sexism in reverse...."
Kudos
Mar 7, 2014 at 4:13pm
Just wanted to say thanks for this post.
Jason M Bryan
Mar 7, 2014 at 4:59pm
Men are much more likely to kill themselves because men are much more disposable and inherently less valuable than women
Don't forget "Women and children first" when abandoning a sinking ship!
K
Mar 8, 2014 at 6:46am
I don't think you've been out in the world recently because it's women who are seen as less valuable....and you're seriously quoting Titanic to get sympathy on a feminist blog? Please.
Paper Plate
Mar 8, 2014 at 8:27am
Men are more likely to be physically assaulted
Men are more likely to be murdered
Men are more likely to commit suicide
Men represent 90% of the homeless
Men represent 98% of work place deaths
Men, if we include those that are incarcerated, are more likely to be raped and sexually assaulted.
@Jason M Bryan
Mar 8, 2014 at 9:34am
Too true---men are treated like cattle, coercively taxed, all to provide a Gravy Train for feminists.
End the income tax! End the Gravy Train for fascists!
HellSlayerAndy
Mar 8, 2014 at 9:36am
You missed one, dear
Supreme Court strikes down Canada's prostitution laws
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/supreme-court-strikes-down-canada-s-pros...
Did you fall asleep on a bus and miss it or something?
The law
Mar 8, 2014 at 10:22am
Because the comments on an article about feminism justify feminism. *looking at you Mr. Jason M Bryan*
Steve
Mar 8, 2014 at 10:26am
Some of these points are really dubious. e.g: #2, there's a difference between "defending rapists" and criticizing the rush to judgment based on incomplete and/or unreliable information. And how can you definitively call them "rapists"? I didn't realize we replaced the criminal justice system with trial and conviction by social media.
Hazlit
Mar 8, 2014 at 10:38am
Bravo! Just remember many societies and cultures moving from a tradition of inequality to one of equality will become more conservative and intolerant (and thus increase inequality, violence, etc.) and do so for an unknown period of time before social mores in those societies begin to shift.
While I would generally support protest and gender equality wise gender revolutionaries should put their money on the fact that violence against women (viewed from a global perspective) will get worse before it gets better. Rich countries, and ones with long traditions of equality are far and away the best places for women's rights.
And while we're at it, please remember that for many young men, the failure to find good jobs and their dire economic circumstances means that no woman will be their girlfriend or wife. Their anger and disappointment at this situation causes them to lash out, unfairly, at women as in some way the cause of their perceived failure.
A woman truly committed to reducing violence and discrimination against women would be preoccupied with finding ways for young men to find better jobs, get married and start families, because ON AVERAGE, husbands and fathers with secure incomes are less likely to commit violence against women and more likely to be amenable to gender equality arguments.