International Women’s Day (IWD) is upon us, a time to reflect on equality for women and increase awareness of discrimination. International Women's Day was honoured for the first time in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland on 19 March 1911. More than one million women and men attended IWD rallies campaigning for women's rights to work, vote, be trained, to hold public office and end discrimination. Demands we are still making today. IWD was later marked for the first time by the United Nations in 1975.
The theme for 2025 is “Accelerate Action”.
At the current rate of progress, it will take until 2158, which is roughly five generations from now, to reach full gender parity, according to data from the World Economic Forum.
Focusing on the need to Accelerate Action emphasises the importance of taking swift and decisive steps to achieve gender equality. It calls for increased momentum and urgency in addressing the systemic barriers and biases that women face, both in personal and professional spheres.
It is important to keep in mind that the challenges to gender equality are broad and different throughout the world. What looks like equality to us in Australia, with equal pay for example, might not be the priority for girls and women in parts of the world who cannot even gain access to education. As a Columban co-worker working in the field of interfaith dialogue, the focus for the women from the different cultures and religions I meet in dialogue is often one of survival. Women are fleeing war, violence, poverty and oppression. We really do need to “Accelerate Action” when today, right now, rape is used as weapon of war, honour killings persist, and sexual slavery exists in our neighbourhoods.
Celebrating women’s achievements and resilience on 8 March is great, but at times the pat on the back for a day feels a little frustrating when everyday women the world over are merely surviving rather than thriving because of systemic gender discrimination and violence. Moreover, the demand to resolve this discrimination seems to mostly be placed on women, mostly whom have no power. How about recognising gender discrimination and honouring women in ordinary, ever day life?
International Women’s Day as an opportunity to listen to and become aware of the dire inequality many of our mothers, sisters, daughters, aunts, nieces, friends, colleagues, women, experience daily. It speaks of inequality not just between the gender but between race and class, too. To broaden our horizons, it is imperative to listen to women of religions, races and cultures different to our own, to really know who they are, their challenges to thrive, as well as their strengths. Dialoguing with women from different religions and cultures is a humbling experience, because not only does it show our common humanity in the challenges we face together as women, it also shows our differences in needs and priorities that, hopefully, will bring us even closer through the values of justice and compassion that we share, with sincere and mutual esteem.
Kim Chong is the Media & Community Liaison at the Columban Centre for Christian-Muslim Relations in Sydney.
Comments (0)