GUEST POST: Solidarity to Women First! By Adelaide Ciao

When Women Align With Male Movements: Adelaide Ciao

many of women's differences come when we align ourselves w men's movements. left/right; communism/socialism; dums/repugs it really doesn't matter, women will be screwed EVERY TIME by any and all of men's ideologies. this has been guaranteed globally and historically; this will not change.

as long as we align ourselves with men's regimes we will be divided. when women come to understand that every woman is her sister regardless of what they believe or who they align themselves with, we can begin to focus on the problem; men.

i don't need to convince western women of anything. there are 4 billion women who desperately want their freedom; these are the sisters who don't have time to argue ideology; these are women who don't get to make their own choices; these are women kept impoverished and silenced. THESE are the women we are obligated to fight for--not western white women who have the luxury to make choices...who cares? besides they are not the enemy, we are simply women who are given shitty choices and we make shitty decisions.

we need to get over ourselves and each other and do the very best we can to use our privileged resources to help the women truly enslaved in poverty, in sex slavery, in forced marriages, forced slave labor; as citizens with no rights, no resources, not even the rights to their bodies and their children.

the world is so much bigger than our first world problems. privilege OBLIGATES us to help each other; fighting one another not only destroys us it destroys the other women we can serve because we end up overwhelmed, living in despair and and giving up...

we OWE the women of the world; WE!, every one of us has lived off the backs of women's labor; we all have been given western luxuries provided by female slavery throughout the world. We need to begin to consider THEM. And what this looks like is different for each of us...if we do nothing more than to never harm another woman we've done good; if we do nothing more than to end animosity between us then we've done good; if we do nothing more than to teach our daughters to be strong women then that's a wonderful thing...and as we rise we create space for other women to rise; we owe this to ourselves and we owe this to our Sisters. they are us and we are them; the only thing that separates us is where and when we were born and under what regime; close those arbitrary, random experiences, and We are ALL the same.

               - Adelaide Ciao