In 1980 President Jimmy Carter issued the first Presidential Proclamation the week of March 8th 1980 as National Women’s History Week. Finally, in 1987, Congress passed Public Law 100-9 designating March as Women’s History Month. “We’ve come a long way Baby” since the Suffragette movement from the 1800’s or have we?
During the Suffragette Movement, women were criminalized, tortured, humiliated, and beaten fighting for the right to vote. Today, women are criminalized for choices of reproductive health and having to relentlessly monitor and fight bills that would strip more of our rights away.
Women have been on the front lines for a long time fighting for the right to thrive in an existence of equality. We fight for our families, our children, our parents, our partners, our friends, and oftentimes, strangers who we know are battling with the same struggles.
We still get underpaid for doing the same job as a man although the gap is getting smaller. With the latest study by National Partnership for Women & Families, women are making 84 cents for every dollar a man makes for full-time work and around 78 cents on the dollar for part-time work. The difference adds up to thousands of dollars a year.
Across the country, we organize for Medicare for All, including a higher standard of healthcare as we advocate for our sick loved ones. We organize for fair housing as we see the number quickly growing with families living out of their cars or in one of the thousands of tent cities sprawling from coast to coast. Many of us organize for food security and clean water as we see the effects of lead poisoning in our children and children starving in our own country that is rich in agriculture. We organize for public education as we are witnessing the private sector breaking down our system, pushing Charter Schools that divide by color, class, and religion. We organize and fight hard for gun reform against a force that owns our Congress and their banks manufacturing wars to overflow their coffers. Tired and heartbroken from many other injustices, we watch our hard-earned money fueling their wars, making misery for other women, forcing migration, bombing their homes, killing their children, partners, other family members, and wonder how soon before my family.
We run for office to serve, to hopefully have a say in spending our money on programs that would lift the burden, making living easier for our own and not easier for the rich. Women have been the majority of the vote since 1964 in the United States and yet we have not seized the moment to be elected President. Millions of women have been standing up to fight, but now, we need all women to engage in the movement. Organize, support women, strike! Voting in 2024 must be about protecting our freedoms, our rights. It’s not easy. We know we have a mutual vision. It’s one of health, peace, and love.
Georgia de la Garza, who is from the beautiful Shawnee Forest of Southern Illinois, has served on the front lines as an organizer for social justice for many years. De la Garza has fought for Indigenous rights, Environmental Justice, Labor and Women’s rights on national and global fronts. She serves on the editorial board of the People’s Tribune.
