Today is International Women’s Day.
It’s an officially recognized day (March 8th) trumpeting the economic, political and social achievements of women.
When I went to check to see what the actual theme is for 2012, little did I know what I was getting into.
Confusion abounds.
Here I was thinking that whoever the original group was that came up with the idea to celebrate a global day addressing the successes and challenges facing women would just announce the new annual theme and everybody would get on board.
Silly me. It seems that there are several big players on the world stage, and they each are clamoring for everyone’s attention. The United Nations asserts that the 2012 theme is ‘Empower Rural Women: End Hunger and Poverty’.
We’re just going to assume that they also care about starving poor women in cities and their outlying metropolitan areas, and move on.
The website for the group International Womens Day says that this is the year of ‘Connecting Girls, Inspiring Futures’ and provides a list of events and ways to participate in the commemoration of IWD.
Both themes are taken up by governments, industries, educational institutions, charities, women’s groups and the like.
It does beg the question: why can’t everyone just get on the same page?
It turns out that national groups in various countries may then choose to tailor the theme to meet their own particular situation on the ground. Regional and local organizations and large companies in the business sector are free to do the same.
That’s why a multinational company like IBM’s theme is ‘Success in the Globally Integrated Enterprise’, while the European Parliament’s is ‘Equal Pay for Work of Equal Value’. Another part of the UN is focusing on ‘Women and Men United to End Violence Against Women and Girls’. No word on whether this includes urban females, but I tend to think so.
The IWD website even asks groups to share their themes for this year. Take a look at the list of different themes and sub-themes, and you’ll start to get a creeping sense of bewilderment.
The good news is that International Women’s Day exists at all, that it is officially recognized by so many, and is used to highlight the important issues facing women around the globe.
When you shed light on the condition of one gender, by implication you’re assessing it compared to the other, so it isn’t that men are being ignored. And when you discuss women’s issues, it invariably leads to the state of the world’s children, families, communities.
Besides, it’s not as if improvements to the lives of women don’t affect those around them (i.e., men and children). It’s the old ‘rising tide raises all boats’ argument, and it’s a pretty sound one at that.
Still, I can’t help but wonder what it would be like to see IWD follow somewhat along the lines of the Chinese calendar. Name a year and you know whether it’s the Year of the Dragon or Year of the Rat, as well as when the next Year of the Ox or Goat will occur.
I’m not suggesting that we have a twelve-year cycle of the same overarching themes for IWD.
Although on second thought, would that be so bad? It’s not as if we’re going to solve all of the hunger problems or every single education concern and then be able to say ‘done and dusted’ and move on to tackle the next item on the ever-growing list.
I suppose having a rotating set of high-level themes is probably too much to ask at this point. As humans, we like to feel that we’re savvy enough to take a lay of the land before we decide. We like to peruse our surroundings, observe the wild successes and continuing failures, note new developments and trends.
We want to sift the tea leaves, see which way the wind blows, and then announce THIS is clearly the year of X. Or Y. Z if you’re so inclined.
If something as amorphous as the world’s ‘fashion industry’ can decide that this is the year of thigh-, knee- or ankle-length skirts, body-skimming or flowing freely, in sturdy materials to reflect the serious nature of the global economy or filmly fabrics to capture our sense of whimsy during tough economic times, well you get the point.
If fashionistas are able to assert with authority that ‘persimmon is the new black’, then you’d think that the powers that be in the international development/gender arena could do the same.
I just think it might be nice to have everyone work together. One year, one theme.
Subthemes allowed, but in the same manner as we do in writing: following the main theme and a colon. Oh, and appearing to flow directly from the main theme because they are clearly related.
Employment: Creating New Jobs, Improving the Old
or Employment: Tackling Unemployment and Underemployment
Or perhaps Poverty: Addressing Income Imbalance
See? Is that so difficult?
Apparently so.
In the spirit of international cooperation, let’s just set aside this theme confusion.
Rather than get caught up in the political hierarchy of competing themes, we can take a deep breath, be thankful that these issues are being discussed and worked upon at all, and commit to doing one thing – today, this week, this month, this year – that will help improve the human condition.
In whatever manner, in whichever area you wish. You decide. The needs are great. Just pick one and do something to help out.
There. Was that so hard?
Note: If you’re on Twitter, consider following International Womens Day @womensday. You can also participate in and/or follow the tweet stream with #womensday
Thank you for putting this so eloquently: definitely these are all issues to work on and to discuss and hopefully to make better! Maybe women’s day doesn’t need a theme – it is there to put women’s issues in the limelight, and every country and company and committee has its own favourite, I suppose. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing. At least something gets done, and lots of little steps will eventually amount to a big step. Maybe there are too many steps still to take to bring the different issues together under the umbrella of an overarching theme – looking at it that way, getting to the stage of there being a worldwide overarching theme to work on, would actually mean we as humans had overcome! So, like you, I’m thankful for the baby steps, and celebrate small achievements, in the wait for the improvement of the human condition 🙂
Thank you Katrijn, I do think you’ve captured it. We just keep plugging away at making improvements in the daily lives of the less fortunate among us, and celebrate the small victories of women worldwide. Here’s to recognizing and lauding the baby steps!
I’ve been translating the annual theme for 16 Days Activism to End Violence Against Women for 3 years now, and saw similar phenomena: different organizations, different countries, different activists all have different themes. Although Center for Women’s Global Leadership, the initiator of the campaign, provided an annual theme, the sub-themes that were chosen by organizations across the globe were not always following the main theme. One can see this as being messy, or not coordinated. Like you, I once wonder, why can’t activists all work together on the same issues, one by one? But then I guess it would be hard to avoid the top-bottom feeling if we were to implement that. Who has the privilege to decide the main issue to work on? How to accommodate the different priorities of all grass roots organizations? Wouldn’t it be imposing if they are told to do something that’s not on their priority, just because it’s the “main” issue of the year? So my conclusion is, I like it the way it is now. Confusing, perhaps, but aren’t we live in messy social realities? Sometimes, not overly categorizing might help. Just a thought 🙂
I agree, Chrysant. That’s really the conclusion I came to as well. There are so many needs. Rather than get overwhelmed and throw up your hands, better to focus on one or two and pitch in to help. As I’ve said before in other posts highlighting global issues (human trafficking, refugees, starvation, poverty, etc.), if it’s not your thing, that’s okay. Just find something that is (soup kitchen, cancer research, mental illness, orphans, abused children) and give your time, money, effort and attention.