Despite significant achievements, the reality of women in the world is far from what the pioneers imagined.
El International Women's Day it is a commemoration, a day instituted to remember the dark past and reflect. There is nothing to celebrate (in terms of parties) and much less is it a date linked to the commercial spirit of the modern world that permeated the essence of Christmas, Valentine's Day or, in our Latin countries, Mother's Day or of the father.
Due to the influence of the media, the trends of social networks and the brands that see this commemoration as an opportunity to sell, International Women's Day is welcomed in many countries as a holiday. The women are thanked for their presence and are celebrated with a present, a deeply rooted custom in the workplace.
However, this behavior, this interpretation of the commemoration, is alien to the events that gave rise to International Women's Day. That, it is worth emphasizing, they have nothing to do with the commercial, yes with the labor. For this reason, more and more women are dissatisfied when their environment, especially men, assumes this day as a party.
What is commemorated, then, on International Women's Day? The courage and struggle of thousands of women around the world in favor of equal rights and gender equality. The unusual thing is that more than 200 years after the first manifestations, the problems remain. The difference is that today, thanks to the power of technology in the globalized world, they are visible.
In the XNUMXth century, the time when this movement was born, women had no rights. So literally. They were completely dependent on the men who accompanied them, who provided them with sustenance and gave them approval to carry out any activity. At that time, women did not have access to education and could not exercise the right to vote.
What has changed?
Little, very little. Let's see some figures from the United Nations Organization (UN) that allow us to understand that the problems are in force:
1.- There are 2.700 billion women who cannot access the same job options as men.
2.- In 2019, less than 25% of parliamentarians were women.
3.- One in three women continues to suffer gender violence.
4.- Of the 500 people in CEO positions leading the world's highest-income companies, less than 7% are women.
5.- In the 92-year history of the Oscars, only five women have been nominated in the Best Director category; of the five, only one won the award (Kathryn Bigelow).
6.- And until 2086 the wage gap will not be closed if the current trend is not counteracted.
Another important fact is that many girls are forced to work without receiving anything in return and many others are prostituted and used as mules for drug trafficking. According to Amnesty International (AI), “Women and girls are more at risk of economic poverty around the world. There is no country in which there is economic equality between men and women.. Time passes, and things remain the same.
“Poverty increases the gender gap and vice versa. Gender gap and poverty are two interconnected inequalities that violate women's rights”, points out this organization that works for human rights. On the other hand, the UN stresses: “70% of the poor in the world are women and one in five girls lives in conditions of extreme poverty”.
The reality is that we live what AI calls “feminization of poverty”, a situation that “violates their rights, slows down social development and global economic growth”. Although progress has been made in some respects, there are reasons for concern: “Although women do 66% of the work in the world, they only receive 10% of the income and own 1% of the property”.
Mentioned the proportions, that was the environment in which the women of the 1791th century lived, when Olympe de Gouges wrote the Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen, the other side of the coin of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, created after the French Revolution. It was the year XNUMX and a great transformation was beginning to take place.
In the 1948th century, hand in hand with industrialization, the oppression of women was more evident. So many limits were exceeded, so many rights trampled on, that they finally raised their voices. And they did it with force. In XNUMX, in a town near New York, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, pioneers of feminism, convened the first national convention for women's rights.
A great audacity, without a doubt. That meeting concluded with a statement that would become the first official document in favor of feminism in the United States. Then, on January 1, 1863, Abraham Lincoln decreed an end to slavery and equal rights and privileges for all, a breakthrough that was unfortunately slow to move from theory to practice.
The event that changed history happened in 1908. Within the framework of a strike that demanded a reduction of the working day to 10 hours, a salary equal to that of men who did the same activities and the improvement of conditions, a fire broke out. at the Cotton factory in New York. 129 workers died, the majority young immigrants between the ages of 14 and 25.
A year later, in February 1909, New York celebrated National Women's Day for the first time. More than 15.000 women took to the streets to demand the improvement of working, social and civil conditions. Being in 1910, during the II International Conference of Socialist Women, in Copenhagen (Denmark), where March 8 was proclaimed as the International Day of Working Women.
All these battles paid off. In 1918 the vote for women over 30 years of age was instituted in England and in 1928 the voting age was regulated to that of men. Meanwhile, in the US in 1920 the right to vote was granted to women in all states. In Latin America, the first country that approved women's suffrage was Uruguay: the first time was on July 3, 1927.
Throughout the 1975th century, the successions were continuous. Finally, in 8 the UN established March 200 as International Women's Day. Although there have been significant achievements for more than XNUMX years, there is nothing to celebrate because women are still subject to discrimination, multiple forms of violence, and their rights are not respected.
It is precisely for this reason that March 8 of each year is a date to reflect and, above all, to act. There are a thousand and one reasons to continue the fight that courageous women began back in the XNUMXth century, a long and painful path in which many gave their lives for the cause.
Fortunately, the seed sown by so many anonymous heroines germinated. Today, although few compared to men, there are many women who have taken over as pioneers of the women's revolution and extended their legacy. Today, happily, there are many women who have broken down obstacles, who have broken paradigms, and written a success story.
Physicist Marie Curie, activist Rosa Louise Parks, chemist Rosalind Franklin, writer Virginia Woolf, the designer Coco Chanel, the Mexican painter Frida Kahlo, the martyr Anne Frank and the Pakistani activist and blogger Malala Yousafzai are just some of them.. And there are more, many more, hundreds of them, anonymous heroines who have managed to transform the world.
An example in this sense is the contribution of our CEO Ana Maria Carrasco. Venezuelan, daughter of Spanish immigrants, she has always known the difficulties in this area. Her parents disembarked as stowaways and with a dollar in her pockets and upon arriving in Caracas, her only baggage was her dreams and the love they felt for each other. She was enough, however, to build a family, fight for her goals and give her family a better future.
After two years in Venezuela, María Victoria was born and, two years later, María Esperanza. Ana María, the youngest of the house, arrived eight years later with serious health problems and was on the brink of death when she was only two months old.
In the midst of this context, the doctor who attended her gave them some advice: Little Ana's only hope of recovery was for her to live by the sea. Every weekend the family went to Laguna Beach, in the north of the country, on the shores of the Caribbean Sea. After a while, Ana María showed signs of improvement, coming to recover and heal completely.
That was the beginning of a powerful connection with the sea, the environment and nature, essential areas in his personal development. Shortly after, Ana María learned about skiing, thanks to a Dutch couple named Stähle, beginning to practice and pave a path full of achievements, successes and satisfaction, a golden page in the history of Venezuelan sports: the Carrasco dynasty.
A decade later, Ana Maria she was not only the best skier in the country, but also a figure of the sport. She was world champion in the 80s, in the modalities in figures and combined; she setting several world records in figures and winning the most important tournaments in this sport, such as the US Masters, the Pan American Games and the World Games, among others.
Great successes that opened the door of business for him. A profession, a passion that he developed in parallel. At the age of 28, he retired from competitions graduating in Business Administration. As part of her professional experience, she was a star distributor for 33 years for Oakley, a famous sports eyewear brand.
This learning was the key to developing IOCA Group, thanks to the identification with the sport and the demand in meeting objectives. Four decades have passed, a period in which the company, hand in hand with its CEO, innovated in a management system that helps other companies to become leaders and benchmarks in their industry. An adventure that today, in the midst of the digital age, continues its march.
At IOCA Group, every day, but especially on International Women's Day, we feel very proud of Ana María Carrasco. Due to her values, principles and character that have led her to lead this business initiative to which own brands such as BEVU, a reference as a sustainable product. With his example, honor the memory of the anonymous heroines of history, extending their legacy.
There are many women who have written a beautiful story of life and success at IOCA Group at the hands of Ana María. She is an inspiration and a role model for the new generations. It is for women like her, whose work has left a positive mark on the world and on the lives of others, that International Women's Day is commemorated.
