These Funders are Fierce Feminist Fighters
I recently spent two and a half days at a conference with 400 fierce feminist fighters. It was a little unexpected. Let me explain.
For the first time, GEC joined a network called Women’s Funding Network. Though our organization is different from the majority of members, who are traditional ‘women’s funds’, our model does meet the membership criteria as we are an organization that funds female-centered work. Yes, we do a lot more than funding, but we are a funder too, and a significant one, at that.
As GEC is trying to expand our networks and learning circles, we decided to give this affiliation group a try and dive in by attending their bi-annual conference called Women Funded. As my understanding goes, a ‘women’s fund’ is generally a group of philanthropically-minded women that get together, pool their resources in some way and use their funds to support women and/or girl-focused initiatives. It’s a philanthropic model apparently on meteoric rise, but that’s a topic for another time.
I am personally not a member of a traditional women’s fund and as mentioned, new to this network sphere, but my understanding of their work is that it is good, it is well-intended and that they ‘help’ women/girls achieve better lives.
Yet what I witnessed during my two and a half days left me with a revised understanding of what these groups are actually doing, because you see, they are actually fierce feminist fighters — though they may not be self-describing in quite that way. If it were a super-hero flick, the room would have been filled with capes emblazoned with FFF!
I witnessed a group of impassioned advocates and activists fighting for a gender-equal world. Fighting for an end to gender-based violence. Fighting for fairness and equal opportunity. There was a passion and determination that I did not expect to witness and experience. Every panel, every discussion, every speaker — the breath and depth of expertise of their arena, experience in fighting the fight and steely-determination to keep the movement going forward until we have an authentically gender-equal world. Four hundred ‘fiercely feminist fighters’ to right what is so wrong in our world — and I was one of them!
Let’s take our own work as an example. We are the ‘girls education collaborative.’ We are working to decrease the number of out of school girls around the world by increasing the number of girls finishing school after gaining a high-quality education.
But why? Because, these girls are out of school simply because they are a girl. Their human rights are being savaged when their genitals are cut off before they even reach adolescence and they are viewed as sources of income and bartered for cows into marriage — when they should be in school. They are sexually violated when they walk to school, or are in school, and so they stop going to school. They are expected to spend hours each day fetching household water or wood; depriving them of school hours. They menstruate each month and may not have products to use or a girl-friendly school toilet — so they miss school, again, because they are a girl.
GEC is trying to get more girls in safe, quality schools precisely because we too are fierce feminists. And perhaps we should be proudly saying that more often, more clearly, more fierce-fully. Perhaps we should wear our FFF super-capes a little more frequently, a little more boldly. I clearly witnessed during this gathering that there are cohorts of committed and resourced groups who are investing their talents, time and treasure to the fight for gender equity, and with some extra attention for those most at the margins, those most overlooked — be it girls of color within the USA, impoverished women across the globe caught in inequitable systems, or the girl in rural Tanzania who said to me “My father doesn’t want to pay my school fees. He only sees me as a source of income. He wants to sell me for a cow.”
Each of us attending Women Funded, in our own model and strategic pursuit, is doing more than ‘nicely helping’. Together, we are fiercely marching towards the same gold ring.
I tip my hat to the women in the room*. I applaud my fellow fighters for the amazing work they are doing. I am encouraged and energized by the change that IS happening, by the progress being made. I double-down because our work is far from complete.
I invite you to grab your cape, join us, and quicken the pace towards equality for all.
*While not EVERYONE at the conference was female, and hat tipped to the 10 or so men in the room, almost everyone was female or female identified.
