International Women's Day.

It's International Women's Day (International Men's Day, by the way, is on November 19)... and I was wondering whether I should blog about this, or not (and obviously, I did decide to do so).

I'm always a little torn on these "Something Something Day" things. On the one hand, I think it's good and helpful to be reminded, once in a while, of the "Something Something" - of the good sides and the bad ones. Of the fact that no, for instance, men and women are not created equal; there are both gender differences that are natural, and those that are nurture, and the question is whether the nurture ones still benefit our society and us as individuals, or whether we should look at them with a critical eye and maybe get rid of them.

On the other hand, there's a little part of me that thinks that having a day more or less "devoted" to a Something Something might as well lead to that being topic of the day, people getting all behind the cause verbally, and then going back to business as usual and not giving the thing any more room, or thought. And there's a lot of "Something Something Day"s these days... many of them tongue-in-cheek, yes, but quite a lot of them are also in earnest, with some of them also being hyped for some reason or other.

Prime examples of the hyped days that come to mind are Valentine's Day and Mother's Day. My mum always ranted against Mother's Day, for instance. Not because she would not enjoy breakfast in bed, or little presents from her children, or hates flowers - she felt that honouring mothers (or partners, or all other human beings) should be something done every day, not shunted into one single 24 hour period once per year... and that instead of spending time, effort and money for making breakfast once a year and buying flowers, a few minutes' worth of additional work in the household every day during the year would be a much more helpful present.

That is, undeniably, a true thing. But overall, hypes aside, at least these days can serve as a reminder that what we have, or can do, or the world that we live in today are not to be taken for granted - and that we should show our care and appreciation once in a while, or do something to make the world a better place, a small step at a time.