Today is International Women's Day.
Much can be said about the role of women in the world but I think the overriding point to note is that, as the majority gender on the planet, women deserve a larger voice in the way things ought to be.
It seems that when women run a country, it seems to be run just a little more equivalently. There are exceptions of course...Maggie Thatcher springs to mind...but those exceptions seem to be mostly influenced by hard-line autocratic political machinery rather than a woman's passion and dedication.
Given what a woman has to go through in order to be heard even on a local level, it seems to me that successful women have what we Finns call sisu, or a stick-to-it-tiveness that eventually melts opposition away.
And that's unhealthy. Opponents should be swayed by argument and logic, not by "Here, let her have what she wants."
Indeed, part of the conservative backlash in this nation is the self-perception on the part of conservative men that they've "given in," which allows them the illusion that their arguments were petty, weak, and wrong-headed. It's not the argument that's wrong, the logic goes, but the arguer who was weak.
Which is why stupid ideas like "tax cuts = wealth for all" still hang around despite thirty years of facts and evidence compiled against them. Worse, there's an element of fear, of loss of control, influence and entitlement that makes conservative men (and their chattel, conservative women) into mindless automatons unwilling to listen to new ideas that mean progress.
We liberals are sort of stuck with this, and praise the Lord for that. I'd rather be on the front end of where the world is headed than on the ass end: the view is better and it smells infinitely preferable.
Here's to women. Long may they reign.
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