The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any. - Alice Walker
When I organised World Woman I was keen to emphasise the need for freedom of expression
for activists and artists, to identify that those who are most likely
to be silenced by the religious right most often share the culture of
those who wish to silence them: that this is not a conflict of the
enlightened West versus the obscurantist East, but against extremist
ideologies that threaten all our shared liberties. I wanted to celebrate
the courage and creativity of women like Nawal el Saadawi and Natalia Koliada, imprisoned for their activism, like Shirin Ebadi, exiled from her native Iran, her Nobel prize seized by the authorities of her home country, and like Fawzia Koofi,
Afghan parliamentarian in a country where politicians, and women in
particular, run incredible risks in the face of the Taliban. We saw
activists who have prevailed against pressures from inside and outside
their families and their countries, like Hina Jilani,
who has faced arrest, death threats, propaganda, intimidation and
attempted attacks on herself and her family, and artists like Sheema Kermani
whose desire to dance was ranged against the fiercest repressions. The
sense of solidarity between women, so many of them facing similar
barriers, having experienced similar challenges, was intense and
exhilarating, and part of the success of the event.
