It’s a women’s world, so to speak, and this month we’re highlighting all the reasons why. International Women’s Day (IWD) is just around the corner and like all great things, it’s only right that we acknowledge the stories of women who have made and are making waves in their respective fields. But before we do that, how’s a little bit of history?

Today, IWD strives to be inclusive of all women, no matter their differences, your gender-assignment at birth, your race, your sexual orientation or your disabilities, it’s about all women. But it hasn’t always been, nor does it always feel like it.

Once upon a suffragist movement, the fight for equality was intended for White women alone. American suffragist heroes Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, are credited for starting a movement, that in truth has many a diverse origin and many mothers, rendered African-American women nearly invisible during their fight for the women’s vote.

Stanton, who in truth was a classical liberal racist, was known to publically embrace equality while simultaneously voicing bigoted views about African American men, whom she deemed ‘Sambos’ and incipient rapists in the post-Civil War period. Her views heavily influenced the movement and as a result, the suffrage took on a similar vein, often selling out the interests of Black women when it became politically beneficial to do so. Women of colour were often excluded from the conversation, made to march at the back so the colour of skin did not offend or sway discussion and often had to pave their own way. It was a betrayal of trust that created a rift amongst feminists, one that we continue to see persist in modern day.

There’s a lot of controversy around feminism, the greatest issue being that we often disregard the intersectionality within it. Not all women are the same and many of us are fighting more than just this battle. While on a larger scale we talk about gender equality and in abstract include all women, often in practice, when individuals, smaller groups or organisations, go to advocate for it, their efforts tend to stop at cis White women. 50% of the room must be women, many have conceded, but the diversity of those women is too often not considered in the initial steps, if at all.

The fight is not just sexism, it’s racism, ableism, xenophobia and transphobia. For many, you cannot separate these prejudices and that is something that many are still yet to understand to a depth where their verbal acknowledgment becomes impactful action that truly makes a difference. It’s great that we are beginning to see well documented arenas, such as Hollywood, slowly give non-White individuals their flowers, but that’s not enough. We need to see and feel more of that impact in our day to day.

So, this month I want to encourage you to look at your spaces and evaluate your surroundings. Is the company that you work for male dominated? Or are there some women, but not enough? Alternatively, is it that there are lots of women, but not a diverse enough group of us? Notice your spaces and advocate for those environments to become more inclusive, for it is in embracing those that are different to us that we can grow as a people.

Everyone brings something to the table, and so long as someone is missing, the table is not complete.

And with that said, kicking off with the month’s highlights, here are the stories of two women, whose tales are ones for the ages:

Eileen Gu

Eileen Gu, a San Francisco-born Chinese-American, made waves in last year’s Olympics when she made the decision to switch from team USA to China. Born to an American father and Chinese mother, Gu, a freestyle skier, proudly embraces her dual-citizenship and has often expressed gratitude for both places and how they’ve made her who she is today.

As a dual national myself, I found Gu’s story inspirational. Despite the backlash she received, the pressure to choose and the political tensions between the two countries, Gu has consistently claimed her two identities, stating: “I’m American when I’m in America and I’m Chinese when I’m in China.” Often, being a dual national comes with the risk of being perceived as a perpetual foreigner, but last year Gu defied those who sought to box her in and in all the Olympic glory that she has achieved since, continues to do so.

Ruby Bridges

At the tender age of six, Ruby Bridges cemented her place in the civil rights movement when she became the first African American student to integrate into an elementary school in the south in 1960. That year, a federal court ordered Louisiana to desegregate and create entrance exams for African American students. Ruby, along with five others passed. However, despite the acceptance of all six students, it was ultimately only Bridges who would attend William Frantz Elementary School.

Bridges and her mother were escorted to and from school every day for a year by federal marshals who protected them from angry crowds and protesters screaming slurs. This included a woman who held out a doll in a coffin before them “that [she] used to have nightmares about”. The above image is one of the most powerful to emerge from the civil rights movements. A young Bridges walks, small but unknowingly mighty, paving the way for the children of today.

In 1995, Robert Coles published his children’s book, The story of Ruby Bridges, which Bridges helped to promote by travelling the country and talking to children in schools about Black history in America, something she continues to do today. 

*Sips Tea*

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