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- This IWD silence is loud
I know you know that I’ve been an International Women’s Day skeptic at the best of times… but I’m more apprehensive about IWD this year than ever (it’s this coming Friday). For one thing, this year’s UN theme – Invest in Women: Accelerate Progress – is probably going to be distorted into celebrate the funding, investment and commercial success of individual women, when the true intention is about funding initiatives that advance women’s equality and liberation. Scroll down, we’ve highlighted our new article about the issue with this below.
What’s driving most of my anxiety is that we’re about to see organisations, influencers and media happily talk feminism and women’s ‘empowerment’ this week who have been noticeably silent on Gaza. Sorry, scratch that: silent on genocide. There’s one major women’s publication/organisation who have been spruiking their IWD event for months and have not published anything on the plight facing the women and girls of Palestine. This is an organisation with high profile ‘feminists’ in its leadership… and yet, not a peep.
It is not possible to be a feminist if your interest in gender equality is solely about women in Australia.
To ignore how intertwined all of our struggles are – not just women around the world, but all people around the world – makes us less powerful. It makes us less capable for creating positive progress, of inching towards liberation. What kind of feminist would want to limit our chances at success? To say that our battles should be fought solo?
It’s a very selfish, corporate vision of women’s ‘empowerment’ (I really fucking hate that term) that is sadly the mainstream, at least in Aus. Of course, none of this is new but all I’m saying is it will be even harder to swallow this year, when the March 8 feed will be alternating between inspirational clips of female entrepreneurs and the grey, blank faces of little girls who are either traumatised or dead.
Even if a (hypothetical) high-profile Australian feminist did not care about the above, they must care about how this particular genocide is highlighting local censorship, propagandising, surveillance culture, the expansion of ‘masculinised’ industries – like war, duh – rather than feminised ones, the limit of so-called representative politics, the emboldening of Neo-Nazis. A respected female journalist, Antoinette Latouff was silenced and sacked by the national broadcaster over sharing independently verified facts about starvation in Gaza, because of private lobbying by a right-wing Zionist group. Ironically, Latouff’s next hearing at the Fair Work Commission will be on International Women’s Day.
All these things must matter to Australian feminists, right?
I’m not saying anyone has to make Palestine their focus on March 8; I’m not saying we can’t care about multiple things at once. I am saying that I will not take seriously any public figure or organisation participating in IWD, that has not already been vocal in their stance against Israel’s genocide and Australia’s complicity. I hope you’ll consider viewing IWD 2024 – and feminism in general – through the same lens.
Good stuff on Zee Feed rn:
"Simply funneling funds into any women-owned venture isn’t exactly the point of this theme; just because a business is owned by a woman doesn’t mean that it inherently champions the cause of women’s liberation." CLICK HERE TO READ.
Smart stuff on the Internet 💭
All the stuff I found on the web that made me think, smile, or have an ‘aha!’ moment. Spend your Sunday reading them – you'll be better off for it:
Uncovering the higher truth of Jay Shetty on the Guardian
"I first met Shetty last March, when I was assigned to write a profile of him for Esquire magazine. After attending his stage show, I became skeptical… He invited a different woman on stage and had her call her estranged brother, whom she hadn’t spoken to in years. When the call went to voicemail, Shetty instructed her to leave her brother a message while we all listened. A woman sitting two seats to my right audibly remarked: ‘This is mortifying.’”
The media exploited Lamarre-Condon’s homosexuality when reporting on the murder of Luke Davies and Jesse Baird on All The Heterosexual Nonsense substack
“A close friend of Jesse’s revealed that contrary to police reports, Jesse and Lamarre-Condon never dated… It’s easy for fools to call a double homicide “a love triangle gone wrong”, a frame usually applied to dead women to minimise mens’ violence against them. It’s just as undemanding to claim it as an example of “gay on gay violence” to paraphrase the anti-Black dog whistle. Last I checked you don’t get handed a gun if you come out - if the Constable wasn’t a cop both of his (alleged) victims would likely be alive.”
How glowing up ruined my life by Alivia D’Andrea on YouTube
Alivia has been documenting her ‘glow up’ journey for the past six years, and has now released a final video about just how acutely miserable the whole process made her. The idea that self-acceptance > feeling hot is not new, but it’s rare to see such a visceral account of how toxic the spirals are when you hyperfocus on looks.
Would you let YOU into heaven? on No Deep Dives podcast
FLEX MAMI HAS A NEW PODCAST. It’s thinking out loud on philosophy, culture, society… ish topics. Or, as she more eloquently puts it, “decoding the riddle of life”. It’s launched with three eps, but this episode is my pick – like, I was actually laughing out loud. Everybody say “thank you Flex!”