WOMEN ' S
MARCH
Women ' s march made headline news across the globe, contributor Reshma Madhi tell us why she marched in London.
For many, Trump winning the US Presidential Election was the final of many final straws of 2016( the Brexit vote coupled with the sudden and numerous deaths of many of our music and entertainment legends). It seemed somehow so unreal. Suddenly we were wondering, how did this happen? How does someone so bluntly prejudiced and very much a member of the establishment many said they were voting against, get rewarded with winning one of the most powerful seats on the world political stage? His persona in our celebrity and self-engrossed world is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, he plays perfectly into what people love and hate and divides them on this line. He gets off on the bravado and grabs the world’ s attention. In a way, I hate that I am consuming it all. I don’ t want to, yet what he symbolises and what is so unpredictable about him cannot be ignored. Perhaps him becoming the US President has an advantage though. People are rising and uniting. We needed to sit up and pay attention and immediately, the day after his inauguration, there was a powerful response. I’ ve never protested before. The last significant one I remember was against the Iraq War. I was too young to have known the protest waves of the Sixties or the civil rights movement, yet I inherited the philosophies of those like Gandhi, Mandela and Dr King. Those were generations before mine, it wasn’ t something my peers were passionate for. I remember an old college tutor of mine saying to our media class how that was the problem with us: we just didn’ t know how to protest. I remember how we were silent in our response. I wanted to agree with him but I was too afraid to voice my view.
I knew I had it in me though. It even decided what university I went to( Sussex. I visited the campus, saw someone had desecrated the grass with the words‘ NO WAR’ and I knew then that Brighton was where I wanted to go). Perhaps image was too important. I didn’ t want to look like some weirdo anarchist hippie stuck in a time warp because who else protested? What good does it do? It didn’ t stop the Iraq War, right? Although, certain things have been overcome by protest and goodwill. Take civil rights, independence for former colonies, apartheid, the fall of the Berlin Wall. Yes, some of the battles have been bloody and long but there’ s something about the spirit of people joining together to try to overcome and that seems to have been reignited. Events like # BlackLivesMatter showed glimmers of that sense of not wanting to stand back. I was unsure about going to the Women’ s March but as soon as I got there, being part of the crowd overwhelming Bond Street tube station and their bewildered staff changed my mind. How had I not been doing this already? Suddenly I was part of something powerful too. A sea of people from all different backgrounds had come together because they were angry and cared, but it was channeled in a positive way. There was no violence or trouble. Why would there be, at a female led march?! It was great to be part of something so vibrant. Even just walking, singing, dancing and reading the creative, amusing slogans(‘ Trump is a fart, not a president’) helped to keep it light. It wasn’ t grueling to be outside for four hours on a crisp January day, it was an honour to be able to demonstrate that people weren’ t going to be silent anymore. It was amazing to see how many people had turned out for it and I felt very proud. There was no sense of opposition from onlookers- they looked on proud. Well, perhaps there were some slightly bemused faces but there was a sense of:‘ we’ re not just going to accept the way things are heading’. I was proud to be part of the wave that is rising and uniting. Sure, Trump is still President, but the people have spoken. They represent a growing passion and have hopefully inspired others to wake up too. We need to stand up and unite peacefully, thoughtfully and energetically. What we also need is to be organised( it was a little chaotic and haphazard going from the assembly point to the actual march) and to have strong leaders like previous generations that can provide answers many of us around the globe are looking for. The uprisings in the Middle East, Brexit and even Trump being voted President has shown this. Let’ s march.
Reshma Madhi
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