International Women’s Day is a wonderful celebration of half of humanity but also an important reminder that women across the world still face enormous challenges in obtaining equality in general, and the parity of esteemed for their unique needs in many other areas of life – both here at home and aboard.
Here at home, pay gaps and the shocking number of glass ceilings still in our society are a matter of grave concern for a nation where everyone is equally before the law. Added to this is the horrifying rise of not just aggressive, but casual everyday misogyny online which is a constant poison to our body politic and threatens to erode the work of both women and men over the last few generations who have worked tersely to make our society more equal and fair.
Aboard in many nations, the denial of reproductive rights and other impediments to taking full advantage of the opportunities to forge their own destiny not just affects the life of the women in question but holds back society as a whole.
In the end, women’s rights are fundamental human rights, and all of us loses out when we don’t respect them.