By: Kauser Khan ( Associate Editor-ICN Group )
International Women’s Day 2018 theme is “Time is Now: Rural and urban activists transforming women’s lives”.
In India, women are traditionally referred to as Lakshmi, the one who symbolises goodness, prosperity and infinite power.Though womanhood doesn’t need a specific day for celebrations, March 8 asserts the importance of the presence of the femininity that not just gives birth to new life but also nurtures it with love, care and warmth.
On this International Women’s Day, send these special messages to the lovely women in your life – she could be your mother, sister, friend, aunt, daughter, grandma or wife.
Facebook will celebrate International Women’s Day with a 24-hour around-the-world live broadcast, celebratory artwork that people may see in News Feed directing them to the experience, as well as many other ways to support the day.
On Wednesday, Google shared 12 unique comics, beautifully illustrated by women for International Women’s Day, which lands on Thursday, March 8.
According to Google, each story represents “a moment, person, or event that has impacted their lives as women. While each artist tells a unique story, the themes are universal, reminding us of how much we often have in common.”
USA
In the U.S., women will go on strike in what is billed as “A Day Without A Woman.” The day is billed as one of protest and advocacy for gender equity organized by the activists behind the Jan. 21 Women’s March on Washington.
The protest hearkens back to the first women’s day when, in 1908, women marched for better working conditions. Three years later the tradition was exported to Europe, where women in Germany, Austria, Denmark, and Sweden protested for similar causes.
In Argentina, Womens’ Day is marked with the traditional giving of flowers and gifts, but this year activists will also be joining in the international strike.
U.K. & IRELAND
The same will be true this year, with women on both sides of the Atlantic marching for their rights. Irish women will mark the day with a strike in protest against the eighth amendment of the Irish Constitution, which bans abortion. “Strike4Repeal,” as the day of action is called, hopes to pressure the government into calling a referendum on the constitutional ban.
International Women’s Day celebrates the history of women fighting for economic, political and reproductive rights, and we are continuing this fight,” says Ailbhe Smyth, Convenor of the Repeal the Eighth Coalition. “We will not sit by as they decide what rights and freedoms we should have over our own bodies, our lives, and our futures.”
The Irish movement draws inspiration from protests in Poland, where women took to the streets in huge numbers to successfully prevent their government from passing harsh abortion laws last year. Women’s day brings Polish women to the streets once more, this time protesting the “cumulative oppression” of laws governing women’s bodies.
Sturgeon, an ardent advocate for women’s rights, has prioritized having a gender-balanced cabinet and argues that the future of the women’s movement relies upon improving the affordability of childcare.
EUROPE
In Italy, women will enjoy free entry to the country’s museums and cultural sites, which will devote themselves to exhibitions that “celebrate the feminine world” by highlighting art by and about women.
In Russia, where Women’s Day is a century-old holiday that trumps Valentine’s Day in importance, men will be rushing to arrange at times extravagant celebrations for the women in their lives.
In Armenia, March 8 marks the start of an unofficial “Women’s Month” that culminates with a “Motherhood and Beauty Day” on April 7.
MIDLLE EAST
In the Gaza strip, Hamas banned any celebration of the holiday, which is a nation-wide celebration in the Palestinian National Authority.
ASIA
China has long celebrated Women’s Day, though lately the holiday has taken a more commercial bent, largely eschewing the issues the holiday was created to support. Last year, men celebrated the event by donning dresses and high heels to hike up a mountain in Guangdong Province.
