The Equal Rights of Women
Topic: Special Days
If you have JavaScript enabled, you will see that I have got a 'greeting' at the top of this page and also a calendar based information on any 'special' day I might wish to note. If I hadn't checked calendars and done some preliminary research to find out what these days were, I must admit that I would not have given any thought to the fact that today, 8th March, is International Women's Day. In some countries, this day is a National Holiday but here in the United Kingdom, we now seem to take the emancipation of women for granted. The majority of English women are not oppressed and women's rights are widely recognised. Perhaps we don't always have equal pay for equal work but we are not enslaved.
However, there are women in this country who are enslaved. Some are enslaved against their will in the sex trade. In many cases, these women have been tricked into coming to this country from Eastern Europe, told that jobs or education courses have been arranged for them. What a job! What an education! Other women from ethic groups with different cultures are not free to choose their paths in life, to get an education or to marry whom they choose. I'm not saying that arranged marriages are a bad thing, many work very well, but only if the girl is happy to comply with the wishes of her family. So called 'Honour Killings', because a woman has formed a relationship outside of her ethnic or religious group, baffle me. I can envisage no greater dishonour than a father or a brother murdering a daughter or a sister. Nothing a woman has done can possibly excuse that barbaric custom.
Not so long ago, women were oppressed in Spain. That only started to change after the Spanish revolution when women's rights began to be acknowledged. Even in the 1960's, women were expected to obey their husband's unquestionably and to wait hand and foot on them. The 'come immediately when I whistle' syndrome was commonplace as was the 'I must not be seen to be carrying the shopping or pushing the pram' syndrome. The idea of a man sharing the household chores and his wife going to work in an office was untenable as it reflected on his ability to support his family and his wife would have been in the company of (God forbid) other men. For reasons of modesty, a married woman could not join her children in a public swimming pool, as other men would see her in a revealing swimming costume.
The lack of education amongst the poor classes in Spain also meant the virtual enslavement of many young girls forced to work long hours as live-in maids. They had to clean the house (and I mean, clean) every day, strip and air beds, prepare food, wait on table, do the laundry, mend and iron clothes from the moment they got up to the moment they dropped into bed. If they were lucky, they had a day or an afternoon off every week or, in some cases, every month - all very similar to the conditions in this country in the 19th century. Today, the education of women has changed all that and the middle classes can no longer afford the luxury of permanent live-in maids or even a daily help. However, this exploitation of the poor still happens in many countries today where women and children work for a pittance. Some of it fuelled by the greed of the Western World for things like cheap clothes.
Another violation of women's rights is violence. Violence in the home is an obvious problem but there are other forms of 'accepted' violence - one of the worst being female circumcision. A custom that mutilates a women severely leaving her virtually unable to experience a sexual climax and unable to give birth without being cut first and stitched up afterwards. In some case, the removal of tissue in young girls is so severe and the stitching so tight that she will have difficulty in emptying her bladder and further problems can arise when a girl reaches puberty.
Women are human beings as are men, not a separate species. We are the heart and soul of the family, we nurture and give values to our children, we can and do achieve great things if given the chance. In Britain we have women doctors, surgeons, lawyers, engineers, scientists and company directors, to name a few careers now open to women. We have even had a woman Prime Minister. We should celebrate and give thanks for our freedom. We should remember that all women worldwide have the same basic right to be educated, to be emancipated, to be treated with respect, to be free.
