See here and here and here for my previous thoughts from previous years.
I don't have that much to say this year, other than there is still so much work to do. And we can't take our foot off the gas pedal now. This is also actually people's lives, so it's more than just being woke for the sake of it. Yes, you say all the right things, but check your biases. More than sharing stuff on social media, how are you making a difference in the lives of women around you? Are you creating a safe space? Investing in women's work? Respecting women? Contributing to opportunities for women? Supporting charities that help girls across the world?
This year's theme is "press for progress". I especially love it because it gives women agency...it is a call to action so we can accelerate gender parity and equality. We should look out for one another and speak out. We should also learn to see women as more than just wives or daughters or moms. We are first of all, human beings! We are saying no to discrimination; to inequality; to sexual harassment and assault of all forms; we are demanding better.
Look, when you benefit from oppression, you become threatened by every possibility of it being dismantled. Men wrote the laws, they led the countries, they had the better jobs, only them voted for years. So of course our society is constructed to benefit them. Our society has been designed to benefit one half over the others. It will and must stop.
If you still think all this is unnecessary, it's because you are lazy. You are too lazy to do your research. It's that simple. If you don't understand how and why gender equality is important, your parents might have wasted their money on your education. If you retort to stupid statements implying education is what has made some of us radical with feminism; you are probably correct.
So I'm convinced if you are still ignorant, it's willful ignorance. You have chosen not to know. You have chosen a side: the side of injustice. And please, I hope we know that it's beyond such trite things as cooking or who pays for dates. It's much more. It is literally life and death. If you are one of those who think it's the white man's thing and foreign to our culture. As a matter of fact, it is not. Colonialism is what made our culture so patriarchal. Yoruba, for instance, is not a gendered language. There is no special pronoun for women or men. I recently told my brother this and he was quite pleasantly surprised to learn that. Aba women, in the 30s led a fierce riot against fiscal oppression and burdensome taxation and WON. Three women started it. And don't get me started with Funlayo Ransome-Kuti. I want to end #IWD2018 this year with an old caption from someone's Instagram.
"...it's not rocket science, it's not open heart surgery; feminism is a very very simple concept and for the people who have refused to utilize Google. Feminism is simply the advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men. It's not about cooking, who pays on dates, who takes whose name. Those are simply aspects of a general wider movement, and not the root philosophy. Do you believe women should have the same political, social, and economic right as men? Then you're a feminist, kpom kwem.
If you believe in the subjugation of women, you are forever canceled. If you believe women are property, away with you. If you can find any justification for why women should be beaten by their partners, you are a monster. If you believe women should conform to a certain standard of behavior that is not expected of men, you are not intelligent. If you use 'slay queen' as an insult, you are razz. If you cannot respect a woman's sexual agency, you need to be locked up for public safety. If you think that the average man is superior to the average woman solely because of his gender then you need to return your parents school feed.
And finally, if you are a woman or man, but especially a woman, and you ever utter the words "I am not a feminist" we can never be friends and we can not relate. Because feminism is not a choice, it is not an option; it is and has been, an absolute necessity for the survival of the female gender. Therefore, if you are anti-feminism, you are anti-woman, and you are my enemy. 'Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters' Matthew 12 :30 " - Adaku Ufere.
So much for not having much to say haha. But yeah that quote covers it ALL. I could very well have said the exact words.
Also, yesterday was my birthday. Another year around the sun. I wrote on social media that I love the confidence that comes with growing older. And that's all I will say about that haha since this post is already long.
Love,
I
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