Feminist leaders in the year 2020 are focused on cooperation and intersectionality to affect lasting global change for future generations.
If there was ever a time when feminist leaders have proven that they can and should hold their share of the world’s power, it is in 2020. Hundreds of feminist frontline healthcare workers have organized for better patient care while risking their lives, and often dying, to treat those affected by COVID-19. The women who founded the Black Lives Matter movement have been joined by young Black girls leading BLM and Justice for Breonna Taylor marches around the world.
The time has come to teach feminism in the K-16 classroom. When young people are equipped to recognize the gender imbalance in society, they are better prepared to become the generation that ends the sacrifice of children to war, gender-based violence, policing and killing of Black and brown people, and the continued destruction of the planet.
We have been carefully taught to bow down. We now have the models and resources to teach our children to stand up.
The feminist leaders of today are climate activists, care economy workers, elected representatives, economists, and teachers of all genders who work together in intersectional collectives. Organizations as distinct as Black Womxn For, International Council of the 13 Indigenous Grandmothers, Girls Who Code, Association of Women’s Rights in Development (AWID), and SisterSong define this generation of feminists.
Feminist leaders in 2020 dare to imagine and build a world where people can walk freely on the streets. They examine the fundamental concepts and power dynamics of our society and bring marginalized voices to the center of the conversation. In Barcelona, the feminist mayor, feminist activists, city planners, and architects formed a collective and transformed city squares into safe spaces.
Education and cooperation empower feminists young and old to topple the monuments to patriarchy and bigotry and build a better world.