By Lucinda
Marshall, www.dissidentvoice.org, 8/24/06
Women’s
Equality Day on August 26 is celebrated as a commemoration of the 1920
passage of the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote. While
most of us now take this right for granted, in its day, women’s
suffrage was a controversial issue and those who fought for it were
considered radicals.
While this is an excellent opportunity
to honor this significant moment in our history, it is also a chance
to recognize the radical women of our own time who are working not
only to insure that the democratic process really works and that our
votes count but also to rectify the situation when it doesn’t.
One such woman is Bev Harris, founder and one of two 54-year old women
who run Black Box Voting. Harris has worked tirelessly to expose the
problems of our current voting system, particularly the pitfalls of
electronic voting. Her work has raised significant questions about the
companies that make electronic voting machines (Diebold, Sequoia and
ES&S). Harris sees the issue as the need for, “citizens being able to
oversee and authenticate their own elections.” And she points out,
“We, the People, own the government and when you own something, it’s
up to you to manage it. Our children and grandchildren will inherit
this government. The most important inheritance they can get from us
is a government that they still control. We can’t get that by clicking
“send” on an e-mail someone else wrote for us, or by hoping someone
else will take care of it for us. It’s going to be up to us, and for
that reason, the focus of my work now is on teaching citizens
the practical skills they need to achieve real oversight over their
elections and, ultimately, the government itself.”
Mary Lou Greenberg of The World Can’t Wait is another woman who is
concerned with reclaiming the integrity of our country. In “A Call
to Action for the Women’s Movement and Everyone Who Cares About
Women’s Lives,” offers a passionate supporting statement for the
organization The World Can’t Wait. Greenberg, a long time activist in
the women’s movement and the winner of the Susan B. Anthony Award for
grassroots activism from the NYC Chapter of the National Organization
for Women writes,
This movement and all people who care
about the fundamental rights of women are facing a juncture, and which
way we go will decide the future for generations. The pouring of all
hopes and energies into the Democratic Party that has sacrificed the
issue of abortion to “winning” in the mid-term elections leaves us
with this question: at what point will we decide to really fight and
at what point does it become too late?
The women of the pro-choice movement
must resolve to take a radical departure from the strategy that is in
large part responsible for the ground we have lost. Funneling all our
energies, money and imagination into elections and candidates and a
political process that is howlingly disconnected and at odds with
people’s needs, objectives, interests and principles has to be roundly
and decisively rejected.
Unless there’s a drastic shift of
strategy from accepting “what’s possible” within the official politics
of this country that are pitching far right, unless we bust through
the confines that are squeezing the life out of what we have going for
us the most — the initiative of millions of women who are looking for
a way out and asking to be called into action — we are going to lose
it all, and the agenda of the Operation Save America lunatics
now moving to shut down the last abortion clinic in Mississippi will
be the handmaid’s tale we will actually be living.
As we celebrate Women’s Equality Day,
let us honor not only our radical foremothers, but also women like
Greenberg and Harris who are working tirelessly in our own time to
insure a government that is truly representative of the people.
Lucinda Marshall is a feminist
artist, writer and activist. She is the Founder of the
Feminist Peace Network. Her work has been published in
numerous publications in the U.S. and abroad including,
Awakened Woman,
Alternet,
Dissident Voice, Off Our Backs, The
Progressive, Rain and Thunder,
Z Magazine,
Common Dreams and
Information Clearinghouse. She blogs at WIMN Online.