It's just so hard to make fighting women's oppression sound like a fun trip because first you have to give someone the bad news - here it is
International Women's Day. March 8th. Today. It's the time of year when less well-adjusted publications persuade some hungry, young female journalist to diss the sisterhood. "Absolutely no need for it" type of thing. "Look at me," the pieces go. "Apartment in the IFSC. Designer handbag. Blonde highlights. The world is my oyster. My John Rocha crystal goblet is well over half-full, thank you very much."
Okay, so International Women's Day is a drag. Guess what? Even us feminists could do without an entire 24 hours to focus on a wishlist that still seems to have so few ticks on it. As we're cracking open the Bacardi Breezers, clinging by the fingertips on to the notion that, like Gloria Gaynor, "we will survive", we'll be facing up to the plain fact that, for some of us, this year's report card reads: could do better.
It's a difficult thing, preaching the gospel of feminism. You do know that all we want is the same as you. Don't you? It's that simple.
We don't want to be underpaid, underemployed or underrepresented.
We want to be allowed to have babies when we want and we want to be able to cherish those babies - equally.
We want to be equal to you and equal to each other, no matter how old we are, what colour our skin is, what we look like, how much we earn, who we love. We don't want the cake and to eat it, we just want half.
It's such a simple message. It's so hard to get some people to hear it.
For a bunch of gals who can throw some humungous parties, it's appears it's hard to shake off the "killjoy" tag.
When consultant Monica O'Connor was providing training courses to women working on the front line of domestic violence and abuse across Ireland, she would ask them to list the words they associated with being labelled a "feminist". The results, she says, were "sad and distressing". Brace yourselves, ladies: "Ugly, angry, strident, shrill, man-hating, ball-breaking, sexless, humourless . . ."
I could go on, but I'm upsetting myself, never mind you.
It's just so hard to make fighting women's oppression sound like a fun trip because first you have to give someone the bad news. So here it is, the bad news . . . courtesy of Gender Bias Bingo Card - a few numbers thrown together to give a picture of where feminism is now (and how long the road ahead remains...)
Happy International Women's Day!