Join & Connect

Unless you’ve been camped out at the top of Mount Everest for the past week, chances are you’ve heard all about the Women’s March movement. A movement, which began with the intention of making a political statement in Washington D.C., quickly morphed into something more powerful and global. This weekend saw the gathering of almost five million people, in 673 cities around the world, marching in support of women’s rights and many diverse issues that are important, not only to women, but to the whole of society.

As the number of planned marches around the world increased, the organisers, who were predominately women, extended a welcome to anyone who wanted to join, whatever their cause, background, motivation, age, or gender. This gradually became a movement for change.

In a world which constantly demands we squeeze ourselves, our opinions, our very existence, into neat little boxes, with clear labels, the march allowed itself to become a movement for anything and everything that mattered. A show of feminine power, in all its softness, kindness, openness, and peaceful tolerance for others.

Despite the magnitude and scale of unimaginable horrors that many women around the world are still forced to deal with every day, this historic moment gives us hope that we are moving in the right direction. It shows us that right now is an exciting time to be a woman. The quiet determination and show of strength, which unified the world on Saturday, points us in a direction where everything is possible. That glass ceiling WILL be broken. Girls growing up today will look at those who have lit the beacon before them and know that if they can dream it, they can do it.

Of course there is still work to do. Hub Dot is active in 17 cities around the world – the same number of countries where women are not allowed to leave the house without a male family member accompanying them. Only in 2015 were women in Saudi Arabia finally granted the right to vote, albeit still facing other restrictions, leaving just one country (Vatican City) where women have no voting rights whatsoever. To be clear, not all men can vote in Vatican City either – only Cardinals, and they only get to vote for a new Pope.

We marched on Saturday to celebrate this incredible global community of women, who showed up to support each other, irrespective of their differences. Who champion each other every day in whatever ways they can. We don’t believe in labels. We don’t believe in linear one-dimensional stories. We believe that dreaming big is for everyone. We believe everyone has the right to be seen and heard. This weekend was an opportunity to come together, to take a long hard look at the world around us, and listen to the people who said: “The politics of fear and division have no place in 2017”. And we believed them. This is what we marched for – to let our future generations of girls AND boys know that the time is now and the future is theirs.