I came across a lot of materials in Washington DC’s museums on women suffrage decades ago. The movement is really inspiring and stunning to see. Inspiring in the sense that these women did everything they had to in order to get what was rightfully theirs, in the times that were hostile to women’s rights.
Stunning in a sense that almost 150 years later, women are still battling for the right to do what they want with THEIR OWN bodies. We cured a lot of diseases that were fatal years ago. We got close to Mars, put men on the moon and went beyond what we had imagined. We have been talking about autonomous vehicles for years. We make content instantly available almost everywhere on small devices that are much more powerful than computers 40 years ago. Yet, the basic rights of women are still a fight.
Years from now, museums in the US will store evidence of how women still didn’t have this basic right and how they fought to eventually secure it in 2019, won’t they?
Minh Quang Duong 