Viva les Femmes!

99 years ago, Icelandic women aged 40 and older were given the right to vote.

It was on this day almost a century ago, that women's rights movements around the world began to see the award to a very long battle for the basic right of casting a vote, a right we take for granted in most parts of the world in the 21st century.

We celebrate this day despite the conditions placed on this right when first given. It was the day when Icelandic women got a piece of the cake and it is worth celebrating regardless how small the piece may seem to the modern women.

On this day, I like to remember our foremothers, the women who paved the way for my generation to be free to make our own lifestyle choices and not be a property of men as if we were petulant children.

Our battle is not over. We have more obstacles to cross but we must take a moment to celebrate this great victory for womenkind. We continue to be more likely to be objected to sexual harassment and assault, and more likely to blamed for the incident because what we provoked with our choice of clothing or friendly-in-excess demeanor.  

The women's movement today must also be vigilant to fight the conservative forces that try to take away our right to abortion (and several states in the United States have succeeded to do so already), and our right to prevent pregnancy in with contraception in an affordable way.

Equally important is our solidarity, that we stand together and do not judge each other for the clothes we wear or do not wear, our choice of profession and most of all, look out for each other.

Men are not the enemy. They, as a gender, are not the foe. The foe is not gender-specific and tt comes in many shapes and forms; extreme forms of religion, whatever that religion may be, is a force to be reckoned with and we must not surrender to the demands of extremists; women who wrongfully abuse the system to remove fathers from their children; men who are petulant in their gender-stereotyping and objectification women; women that are petulant in gender-stereotyping men unfairly should they fail to meet the demands of masculinity; media that favours men's sports over women's; a society that does not give new fathers equal rights to parental leave, and businesses and organisations that expect fathers to put their work before their family.

As I've already mentioned, some states in the United States of America are placing legal and financial restrictions on women's accessibility to contraception and right to abortion should they choose to have one. In Ireland, abortion is still banned if memory serves me right.

In Iceland, most women are active in the work force, so much that it is a cultural norm for women to be employed. Women are guaranteed their professional position during the three months marked to their maternal leave (as are men), and parents can arrange the additional shared three months however they please.

However, due to the pay gap, an unexplained pay gap of approximately ten percent, many women opt to take their three months in addition to the three shared months and spread them over a longer period of time. Fathers, generally receiving higher remuneration for their professional contribution to society, are therefore less likely to take advantage of the three months let alone the additional shared time.

A professor at the university of Iceland, a professor of political science, claimed in a recent controversial lecture that women have won the fight for equal rights and more so.
He used old school arguments to explain issues such as the gender-based pay gap. Apparently, women are more likely to choose a profession that suits their role as mothers since nature did give them a gift greater than was given to men.

This gift is the ability to carry a life in their womb (which by the way is not given to all women) and that strong bond women share with their children because of that biological link.

Women, due to this physical capacity, have an incentive in life to take more time off from work to nurture their family, whereas men are less inclined to do so and I suppose, more likely to focus on their career.
Therefore the unexplained pay gap is explained by women's lack of enthusiasm to put in the professional efforts men are willing and able to do.

What load of nonsense, I say!

But alas, this is not a day to curse the anti-feminists. This is only one example of an attitude that seems immortal in the minds of its promoters.

Thus on this day, I celebrate the victory of my foremothers while contemplating the path uncrossed that lies ahead of the non gender-biased feminist movement in the 21st century.

We have our work cut out for us, people of all genders, nationalities, age, and race, and our compass is the knowledge that one day we will be liberated from the last mortal restraints of inequality.