| 2004 International Women's Day Event The Center on Women and
Public Policy was once again a co-sponsor of The Ninth Annual International
Women's Day Celebration, organized by Minnesota
Advocates for Human Rights, the Human
Rights Program at the University of Minnesota and The
Women's Foundation of Minnesota, on Saturday, March 6, 2004.
The event included workshops presented by women's rights scholars,
community activists and advocates, highlighting the twelve areas
of concern and strategies for the advancement of women, as articulated
by the United Nations Beijing Declaration Platform for Action. Between
workshops, participants learned from informational displays from
over forty co-sponsoring community and campus women's organizations,
and attended musical and dramatic performances by MaMa mosaic and
Skerettes-MN: A Cameroonian Women's Chorale.
The event opened with an address by Bonnie
Campbell, former attorney general of Iowa (and Democratic candidate
for Governor in 1994) and founding director of the Justice Department's
Office on Violence Against Women. Campbell took audience members
on a journey around the world, highlighting the struggles for women's
rights; from the recent female athlete sexual assault cases in U.S
news headlines, to forced abortion in China and trafficking of women
worldwide. "History is repeating itself," Campbell pointed
to identical newspaper headlines in 1974, and in 2004, which stated
simply that women make seventy-five cents for every dollar that
men make. Campbell said, "The struggle for human rights for
women is a long way from being over."
Highly-respected feminist artist, and longtime contributor to International
Women's Day, Jane
Evershed excited the crowd with her remark that "I think
America would be great if women really were running around the streets
naked and women were all lesbians" how a Chinese taxi driver
described American women to Campbell.
The crowd left the opening ceremony on a high, and headed towards
workshop sessions for the remainder of the day on topics such as
Rape as a Weapon of War, and International Family Planning. The
family planning discussion was led by Tim Stanley, Director of NARAL
Pro-Choice Minnesota who spoke about the global gag rule and
looking at all issues through a "political prism", in
terms of what is being denied to women by politicians. A poignant
take-home from the panel was the simply stated fact that "less
than 25% of women in the world have access to contraception."
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©Photos by Dan Seipp |
