Shocking News Report!

This just in: Women marched all over the country and the world, and as far as I know there were no reports of violence or rioting.Shocking, isn't it? Almost every protest that includes more men also includes more violence. Imagine if women ruled this country or this world, do you think there might be less violence?This is not hatred of men. This is just facts. Women are peaceful by nature, they exemplified that yesterday.So how did women get in the position of not having the same civil rights as men, when there are just as many of us? How did this happen and how can this still be happening? Why are women paid less than men for the same work? Why are women's bodies still put for sale in Human Trafficking and other abusive slavery around the world?I think at this point it doesn't even matter why all this happened and is happening. What matters is how we are going to stop this and how we are going to change.Feminists don't hate men. I don't hate men, in fact the closest, most intimate relationships I've ever had have been with men. I love men.I hate patriarchy.Women marched across the world yesterday, but the work begins today. More women need to run for positions of power, no matter how ingrained in us it is that we should be in the background. Our government should be representative of the people, that means it should be at least half female. Only women can create this balance.All women are capable of making some sort of progress, if not just in our personal lives, but also in the world at large. How are you going to start? Where to begin? How do we do this?I was thinking of joining a group for activism that helps women who are immigrants in America adjust to life here. If this new presidency has done anything good, it has awakened people who would not normally be active, to suddenly want to be activists. I would have never called myself an activist because I haven't done anything. But I think writing, having a discussion and discourse is a form of activism.Ask yourself this: how are you going to react, or act against the new government's probable assault on our civil liberties like legal access to abortions? The march was the beginning of a spirit that must be acted upon. It's not enough to make noise, women know that because we have been shouting about our rights since the beginning of time.Even if your form of activism is raising your daughter to be feminist, then you go girl! Activism starts in the home, it does not mean you have to change the whole world. Just don't expect more from your sons than you do your daughters. What if we started there? What if we told our young girls that they could be anything in the world that they want, including president?Maybe your form of activism is not taking the sexual harassment going on in your workplace. Maybe it's time to report it, to take a stand, even if it means possibly losing your job. Almost every woman will in her life encounter some form of sexual harassment, assault or abuse. Let's make this part of our national conversation.We don't have to put up with this shit.I remember the first time I was sexually harassed by a school teacher. I didn't tell anyone, I didn't even understand that what he was doing was wrong. I felt guilty, as though I asked for the unwanted attention. This was the mind of a young teenage girl in the nineties. Has it gotten any better? It's time, it's time for it to get better.Respect. That is the fundamental principal of the women's movement.Respect me. Respect my body. Respect my mind. And know I also have a soul.I will stand by my notion that god is a man because a woman could not create such a chaotic world. But whether god is male, female, or neither women need to realize we are all goddesses. Our power is in numbers. There is enough of us to make a real difference.This is just some thoughts, from this goddess to you.nina