Girl power! The BBC reports a recent protest run entirely by women:
A ship carrying humanitarian aid, “manned” entirely by women, is ready to leave Lebanon on the first leg of its journey to Gaza in an attempt to break the Israeli blockade. Named the Mariam (the Aramaic version of Mary), it has a multi-faith international passenger list, including doctors, lawyers and a group of American nuns.
First off, I must say stories like these just warm my heart. Honestly. But I’m torn on this issue for a few reasons. I do agree that in a perfect world of true equality, female protesters would be treated exactly the same as men (an argument featured later in the article), meaning that they would receive just as harsh of punishments as men would. Not because we want to be men, but because the act of protesting, if that be something that is against the law, would be equally illegal irrespective of the gender of the person committing the crime.
However, I kind of like that they are doing this. It’s kind of a way of reclaiming sexism, to me. They’re taking something that normally is a detriment to what they’re trying to accomplish (namely that officials don’t take anything they say seriously) and they’re using it to their advantage. I kind of love it, I won’t lie.