WUNRN
International Action Network on
Small Arms (IANSA)
http://www.iansa-women.org/about.html
IANSA woman Rebecca Johnson wrote this article for
International Women’s Day and says, “When millions of
women rise around the world, we'll be able to harness all the days, years and
resources we need to deal with climate change, poverty, violence and war.”
Dreaming on a Mountain:
from Women's Day to Women's Power
Rebecca Johnson,
Women in Black
What is the point of International Women's
Day on March 8? It was first established for working women's rights in
1911 and for decades was barely observed outside the Soviet bloc, where its
origins in women's struggles were suffocated in rituals of men giving flowers
and chocolates to female family members and employees. Such belated
Valentine's gestures may be enjoyed by some, but they hardly make up for the
high levels of alcohol-fuelled violence and the post-Cold War erosion of
women's rights in Putin's Russia, including access to jobs, training and equal
pay.
Moreover, I've witnessed how this
patronising ritual can be used to embarrass and undermine rather than empower women.
When Russian diplomats made a great show of chivalry by doling out red roses to
the few women ambassadors at a United Nations meeting some years ago, the
recipients had to smile woodenly, but they shared their fury in the privacy of
a women-only gathering afterwards. The occasion was an International Women's
Day debate on disarmament and development but the romantic parody of the
Russian action diverted attention from the serious issues of armed violence and
women's security needs and prompted other male delegates to chuckle indulgently
at their female colleagues' discomfort.
Here in
Yet for all the smiles and chants about
women's power, the Million Women Rise demonstration was not so much a
celebration of this symbolic day as a call for us to commit every day to
resisting violence and oppression. One after another, women from the
The harrowing experiences of many speakers
spelled out how militarism and violence against women are inextricably
connected. Speaking on behalf of Women in Black, I also
made links with the work of women in the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA) to halt the arms sales and trafficking that
put guns into the hands of the marauding gangs and rapists who prey on women
and children in Africa, Latin America, Asia and also our own cities here in
Britain and beyond.
From knives to guns and on up to nuclear
weapons, these are the tools that underpin the continuum of patriarchal
violence that movements like Million Women Rise, Women in Black, the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom and Code Pink have been confronting for many years. Last
year, the 9 nuclear-armed countries -
In just that one year, 2011,
Speakers from the British Asian and
Chinese communities, from student organisations, and the trade-union-based Coalition of Resistance described how women and girls are being badly hit by
the Coalition Government's cuts in social services and disability, housing and
other benefits. Despite several waves of feminism since International Women's
Day was instituted in 2011, women in most countries still carry the major burdens
of caring for children and the sick, elderly and disabled. As explained by a
speaker from the campaigning group
Women in Prison, women are also more
likely to fall through the cracks when cuts are made to services that provide
help to deal with problems related to alcohol, drugs, homelessness and domestic
violence.
At the end I sang "The Mountain
Song" by Holly Near. Written in the 1970s to support
Standing in the way of our human rights,
democratic choices, freedoms and political power is a high ugly wall of
military-industrial profiteering. We have to break militarism down to size in
order to see and reach the mountain of our real security.
When millions of women rise around the
world, we won't need an International Women's Day. When millions of women
rise around the world we'll be able to harness all the days, years and
resources we need to deal with climate change, poverty, violence and war.
Rebecca Gerome and Sarah Masters
Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London, EC2A 4LT, UK
Tel: + 44 207 065 0876
Email: women@iansa.org
Website: www.iansa-women.org
The