Abortion is not safe, legal and accessible in any state of Australia. Women receive (on average) two-thirds of the average male wage. Women do the majority of the unpaid labour in the home, work which is neither recognised nor valued.
One in four women are sexually assaulted by the time they are 18 years old (based on reported assaults). Women are in the most casualised, underpaid, least unionised sectors of the work force. Women's bodies are used as objects for advertising. The majority of women have some form of eating disorder.
Despite the sexist reality that most women suffer, the establishment's media and political parties would like us to believe that women have achieved liberation. This is just another way of trying to keep women "in their place", accepting of child-care funding cuts, a GST on sanitary products and the like. If women constantly feel fat, or aren't getting equal wages, or find it difficult to care for children and hold down a job, they are taught to think it's their fault.
The marches and rallies on International Women's Day (IWD) show that it isn't enough to have some women in government and boardrooms; we want liberation for all women, and we're going to fight for it.
Sexism is promoted by the establishment because it is vital for maintaining the capitalist system. Women do the bulk of the domestic tasks, and care for the young, the sick and the elderly. If women were paid for this labour, it would cost the equivalent of 60% of the GDP. So, instead of paying up they try to keep women down.
IWD is one contribution to sparking a broader movement for women's liberation. We need a movement that will fight uncompromisingly for liberation and link up with the struggles of other oppressed groups. Only such a movement, one that aims to change the system as a whole, will be able to secure for women a true and lasting liberation.
Resistance aims to involve the largest number of people, both men and women, as possible in this fight as part of building a socialist future where the needs of humanity come before the interests of private profit.
Come along to the IWD march in your city. See pages 24-25 for details. Join Resistance!
By Angela Luvera