International Women’s Day, also known as International Women’s Day, has been celebrated since 1911. Since then, every year on March 8, worldwide attention is drawn to women’s rights, as well as gender equality. On this one day of the year, the achievements of the women’s rights movement are celebrated, but attention is also drawn to what is still current: discrimination and inequalities.
The motto this year is: “Break the Bias”. Under this motto, stereotypes and prejudices against women and girls are to be highlighted and the consequences of social inequality due to categorizations are to be made visible.
Interesting facts about International Women’s Day
- In 1975, the United Nations officially declared one day a year as International Women’s Day.
- In a good 20 states, it is even a public holiday.
- Germany belongs to the small circle of countries in which International Women’s Day was already celebrated in the first years after its introduction in 1911.
- In Germany, the day was banned during National Socialism, fell into temporary oblivion in the young Federal Republic, and was celebrated with state-directed celebrations in the GDR.
- In January 1919, German women could vote and be elected for the first time in history.
- Even today, there are countries where women’s suffrage is made difficult or withheld. These include Bhutan, Brunei and Saudi Arabia.
- Stubbornly, four women in the 1948/49 Parliamentary Council (Dr. Elisabeth Selbert, Frieda Nadig, Helene Weber and Helene Wessel — as the “Mothers of the Basic Law”) managed to get five crucial words into the Basic Law: “Men and women are equal” (Article 3, para. 2). After long discussions, an addition was then made to the equal rights article in the Basic Law in 1994: “Dhe state promotes the actual implementation of equal rights for women and men and works towards the elimination of existing disadvantages hin.”
Source on the facts: www.lpb-bw.de/08-maerz-frauentag