As women, we play a big role in shaping our future
As women we carry a huge responsibility, privilege and, at times, a burden to strive for equality and keep ourselves safe. But we cannot work alone, says Anna Sofat
It was Mother’s Day on Sunday, and for me it has always been a time to remember and honour my own mother and mother-in-law, and be thankful for my own motherhood. But for the last 13 years, it has also been a time of pain and remembrance for my daughter, Nakita. Losing a child is painful beyond words, and I have learnt to bury my pain. However, I cannot keep it buried when I think of Sarah Everard’s mother, and I’m sure I join everyone when I say my heart absolutely goes out to her.
Mother’s Day is also a time to honour all women regardless. Having a child is not the right path for all women and that does not make them any less of a woman. Some, too, want to be mothers but are not able to, and that carries its own pain. Then there are mothers who become mothers not so much by design but because of circumstance; some may welcome the new addition but for others it might be a challenge they neither wanted or are able to welcome. Mothers or not, as women we carry a huge responsibility, privilege and at times an enormous burden as daughters, partners and as sisters. But we cannot work alone.
There is a striking confluence in Sarah’s shocking murder having been committed in the run up to Mother’s Day and International Women's Day, and amid the ongoing demonisation of Meghan Markle. Or to put it another way, there's no particular confluence and there's nothing striking about it whatsoever.
I used to think as women we had equality here in the UK. Until the day I sat listening to my teenage daughter explain how one of her school friends had been raped while she was drunk, but she didn’t want to tell her family or call it out for fear of the label that would be put on her. It was her teenage girlfriends who tried to pick up the pieces for her. And I wonder how the mother of the boy who raped her would have felt or what she would done about it. I also wonder what that boy has gone on to do.
Almost every woman has been attacked or harassed in some way because of their sex. Specifically, because they are women. That this is a lived experience for half the world. Daily, we are compromised in freedoms that men take as an automatic passport. That is to say, all the freedoms. For example, the ability to walk an empty street without feeling it necessary to clutch a key in our fists.
It is perhaps unsurprising then that a recent social media meme saw a crossed-out ‘Protect Your Daughters’, and instead an ‘Educate Your Sons’ written in its place, as if both truisms were not able to co-exist. Yet are they really so mutually exclusive? One of the saddest aspects of where we find ourselves, in the light of Sarah’s murder, has been even more division and polarisation at a time when we desperately need to work together.
As women, we play a big role in shaping our own future. We are the ones who bring up boys who become men, some of whom become the problem. How much more inclusive might it be, to state we need to ‘Educate OUR sons’. We should all play our part in creating a more equal, kind and just neighbourhood and society.
As mothers we bring up not just girls but boys, and we are often guilty of perpetuating inequality at home and beyond. Boys might well be taught to respect women at home – but that’s often where it ends. I urge mothers of boys to expect better from their boys, not just at home or with women in their own families but in respect of how they treat all women. We must challenge their behaviours whenever it falls short of what we would want for ourselves and our daughters.
As MP Yvette Cooper wrote in 2014, “No teenage boy should grow up persuaded that abuse is normal, or feeling forced to behave in particular ways to prove their masculinity… if we are going to achieve a real-step change in tackling violence against women, we need our sons growing up as confident feminists too.”
As partners and wives, we also need to insist on equality at home, and be brave enough to set standards for what we expect. I understand it’s not easy; I hail from a less than equal household and society myself, but I chose not to follow the pattern I was born into. If you take a small step, there will be plenty of women (and some men) who will help you.
Similarly, as daughters we can support our mothers and challenge our fathers (sometimes mothers) if they don’t live up to our standards. And sisters, we have a great opportunity to hold up a mirror and challenge our male siblings as to how they treat the women round them. While as workplace colleagues, we have much to do to support our female colleagues and challenge the less overt behaviours and language, as well as the more systematic biases that exist.
We can all do better – although I think men do need to step up that much more. In committing to last week’s International Women’s Day message of Choose to Challenge, it’s a duty I feel will define how well I and those around me will live and work. And then we really can go some way to making a society of which we can be proud.