We’ve come a long way with women’s rights and achievements, there cannot be any doubt about that.
Just look at how well women did in film and TV this past year. So many Oscar nominations for female directors and actresses (oh, wait!).
But only a few weeks ago, another court ruling in the United States was passed to tighten the control over tens of thousands of women’s bodily autonomy.
On February 16, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that embryos used in IVF treatment are considered children. This means discarding unwanted or abnormal embryos, or failure to store them securely, will be considered a violation of the Wrongful Death Act.
To sum things up, medical providers and hopeful parents-to-be can be prosecuted on the grounds that they are killing babies because of negligent or unjustified behaviour leading to the death of a minor.
Once again, it was always about control, never life! Now, IVF clinics in Alabama are stopping treatment because of the risk of punishment.
Just two weeks before this, the UK public finally had a conclusion to the devastating murder of 16-year-old transgender girl Brianna Ghey, as her two murderers were sentenced to life imprisonment.
It wasn’t established with full certainty during the trial whether Ghey’s murder, which took place in February 2023, was considered a hate crime, but because Ghey was transgender, she was “more vulnerable and accessible,” said Detective Mike Evans of Cheshire Police.
Now, to add fuel to the fire, J.K. Rowling has donated £70,000 to a ‘feminist’ group (this is a deliberate quotation, because how can you be a feminist and not fight for everyone?) who aim to challenge the legal definition of “woman” in the 2018 Gender Representation on Public Board Act.
I sense now that you, dear reader, are looking for a positive story. Here it is – Greece has recently become the first Christian-Orthodox country to legalise same-sex marriage. Couples will now also be legally allowed to adopt.
Marriage equality is still, to much shock and horror, a topic of great debate across the world. In actuality, it is only permitted in 35 countries worldwide. But this is a historic change, so let’s not digress.
Simultaneously, 70 per cent of casualties in Gaza are women and children, according to Care. Shelters are not safe, and pregnant women, young mothers, and newborns are at great medical risk. As is the case with many humanitarian crises, women and children are the ones to suffer disproportionately more than anyone else.
As AI becomes more sophisticated, so does our use of it – for good and for bad. Deepfake pornography, in which fake photos and videos of people often depicted in violent sex acts are generated using artificial intelligence, is on the rise.
It is becoming easier and easier both to create these depictions and to access them. However, because they are fake, they do not constitute revenge porn, and little can be done.
And let’s not forget that at the current rate, the global gender pay gap will be closed in 131 years.
So, while we are celebrating International Women’s Day and all that has been achieved since the Suffragette movement, let’s not forget what we are still fighting for.
Featured Image Credit: Pexels