My favorite had a subject line that proclaimed, "It's Your Day Ladies!" And included a free shipping offer.
And, there we have it. IWD (not to be confused with IUD) officially became a Hallmark Holiday. Complete with gifting opportunities and lots of "gee, look, women have done lots of neat stuff" messages.
My feelings are mixed. On the one hand, it's nice that the world acknowledges the achievements of my gender. On the other, there's a bit of me screaming inside, "We're half the population, you stupid twits! We shouldn't have to be granted a day to celebrate our accomplishments."
And yet...at least there is some effort to give credit to women achievers.
The way we study history is so deep seated, the only way women get any props for what they've done is through parallel study. There's regular history and women's history. Consider how history is taught in school. It's chronicled by wars and leaders, with the spotlight squarely on the major players, who are predominantly men. If we shifted that spotlight ever so slightly, we could take in the women working behind the scenes, for better or worse, to influence the course of history.
I'm not going to start listing the amazing women who've had to fight for a place at the table. I'm just going to give them a nod here.
And set the record straight on one point. The person who penned "A Diamond is Forever" was Frances Garety. Frances is a woman's name. Which the author of a book on how to advertise didn't realize when he used the "he" pronoun.
Oh well, at least Frances got credit for penning it, right? Even if she had to change genders to get it.
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