EVERY year for more than a century, people around the world have been marking March 8 as a special day for women.
This International Women’s Day, women are smashing stereotypes and asking the world to re-examine gender biases.
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When is International Women’s Day?
International Women’s Day is taking place today – March 8, 2022.
The seeds of International Women’s Day (IWD), were planted back in 1908, when 15,000 women marched through New York City demanding better working conditions.
They wanted shorter working hours and better pay, as well as the right to vote, the BBC reported.
A year later, the Socialist Party of America declared the first National Women’s Day.
The idea to make the occasion International came from a woman called Clara Zetkin.
The concept wasn’t cemented until a war-time strike in 1917, when Russian women demanded “bread and peace”.
The Tsar was forced to abdicate four days into the strike, and women were granted the right to vote.
The date when the strike commenced was translated in the Gregorian calendar to be March 8 – which is why IWD is now celebrated on that date.
International Women’s Day messages and quotes
“I raise up my voice – not so I can shout but so that those without a voice can be heard… We cannot succeed when half of us are held back.”
“When women are held back, our country is held back. When women get ahead, everyone gets ahead.”
“I think every woman in our culture is a feminist. They may refuse to articulate it, but if you were to take any woman back 40 years and say, ‘Is this a world you want to live in?’, they would say, ‘No.’”
–Dame Helen Mirren, actress
‘The best way for us to cultivate fearlessness in our daughters and other young women is by example. If they see their mothers and other women in their lives going forward despite fear, they’ll know it’s possible.’
“Who run the world? Girls.”
“A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.”
-Irina Dunn
“We teach girls to shrink themselves, to make themselves smaller. We say to girls, you can have ambition, but not too much. You should aim to be successful, but not too successful. Otherwise, you would threaten the man.”
“A feminist is anyone who recognizes the equality and full humanity of women and men.”
-Gloria Steinem
MORE ON INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY
Memes to celebrate International Women’s Day
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