World marks International Women’s Day
March 8th, 2010 by Chloe.Setter
Women across the world have today celebrated the 99th anniversary of International Women’s Day (IWD).
The global day champions the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future.
The first IWD was held on March 19 1911 in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland, during which more than 1m women and men attended IWD rallies campaigning for women’s rights to work, vote, train and hold public office.
The tragic deaths of 140 working women in the ‘Triangle Fire’ in New York occurred less than a week after the first IWD, highlighting the plight of women’s working conditions and labour legislation, and became an integral part of subsequent IWD campaigns.
The United Nation’s chosen theme for this year’s event is Equal Rights, Equal Opportunities: Progress for All.
To mark the day, The Independent newspaper has compiled a list of ‘100 women who changed the world’. It includes several gay and bisexual woman, such as the poet Carol Ann Duffy, the psychotherapist and feminist campaigner Susie Orbach and novelist Virginia Woolf. It also highlights the gay rights campaigning work carried out by journalist Joan Bakewell.
A comment piece in the Guardian tells of the launch of a “manifesto” for 21st century feminism.
It said: “This International Women’s Day, we should recommit to a women’s liberation which is connected to a wider movement for human emancipation and for working people to control the wealth they produce.
“That’s why women and men have to fight for liberation. We won’t win without a fight, because there are many vested interests who want to stop us. But more and more people are beginning to connect campaigning over climate change, war and inequality with fighting for women’s liberation.”
In the UK on Saturday (6 March), around 8,000 women took to the streets of London to protest against violence against women as part of the Million Women Rise campaign.
Among those taking part was Laura Colclough, who travelled from Oxfordshire to be present at the march. She told Lesbilicious: “I went to stand together with other women in a public space, hold our heads up and bring the issue of male violence against women out of the shadows and onto the streets.
“I was there for myself as a survivor and for all victims who don’t have a voice.”
Coincidentally, on the eve of IWD, Kathryn Bigelow made history by becoming the first woman ever to win a best director award at the Oscars for her low-budget Iraq war film, The Hurt Locker.
IWD is now an official holiday in China, Armenia, Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Tajikistan and Ukraine.
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