International Women's Day

Today is International Women's Day.  Please read what Marva Nelson, poet, has to say.  And to her I say, "Amen."

Stand up for yourselves, and [you] men who love, admire, and respect us, stand up for us as well. We are not bitches, prostitutes, whores, sluts, skanks, pick a name. We are your sisters, aunts, cousins, mothers, grandmothers, and we are tired, pissed, and fed up with being treated like we are invisible or trampled on like we are a dollar store rug. We are appalled, full of rage, at how easy it is for men to rape, beat, and kill us. We are not happy about how there is still a considerable gap in the wages we make versus the wages men make, and the promotions men get versus the patronizing pats on the heads we get! We are not gals. We are not honeys. Question those, male and female, who make money off our backs by singing about f**king us. Stop buying their music. Stop watching shows that make girlchildren look like potential sexual objects for all the creepy ass pedophiles in the world. Let's call them like they are: child rapists. Write the stations, protest, boycott, picket.

We are strong, powerful, amazing, beautiful generous souls who are so much more worthy than the types of treatment we receive. If you do not stand up, our brothers, uncles, fathers, cousins, friends, then you are not real men. And God help you, because if we can be treated this way, what will happen to you, your girl and your boy children?

Do not stand in the pulpits or at the church altars and ignore what's going on when fellow ministers beat their wives while preaching the Gospel.

Do not patrol the streets arresting people for domestic abuse when your brothers and sisters are inflicting or suffering this type of pain in their homes.

Do not present lessons about the oppression of slaves or women when you oppress others.

Do not speak of honor and loyalty in the military if you are not loyal and do not honor your women colleagues, wives, girlchildren.

Speak out when we are disrespected, abandoned, beaten, murdered emotionally, psychologically, and physically. Speak out when others tell offensive, nasty jokes about us.

We are the future of this planet.