Life

For Women’s History Month, Let’s Skip the Pink

By Helen Chernikoff March 17, 2016

Every March, the American Zionist Movement and the World Zionist Organization celebrate Women’s History Month with an event called “FeminIsrael” that highlights the contributions of Israeli women to the world. This year’s was last night, at WeWork Soho.

I’m a bit ambivalent about history months, but I’m definitely not ambivalent about this:

Bad choice of color.

Now, reasonable minds can differ on the value of history months or awareness weeks or days (or, ahem, blogs). I’ve always been suspicious of them, wondering if such attention doesn’t further diminish the status of the group so saluted by acknowledging that they need special attention.

Then a few weeks ago I read that no less a feminist than Lena Dunham used to have the same doubts. In her March 1 Lenny Letter she revealed that she now supports history months because, she says, marginalized groups need to seize every chance they can to tell their otherwise silenced stories.

I couldn’t reach the FeminIsrael organizers today, but I’m sure the event is well-intended. No organization wants to become the rose-colored boxing gloves of the Jewish communal reception circuit. Its honorees — some of the women who comprise Israel’s Delegation to the UN Commission on the Status of Women — deserve the recognition they received last night and much more.

But think about all the gendered marketing in the world and how it talks down to half of humanity. To some this blog post may come off as a quibble, and there are certainly worse offenses against women happening all the time.

But the color pink tends to trivialize women, not honor them. Deploying it in this context is self-defeating, and quite possibly irritating to the strong and self-aware women such an evening is meant to praise.

Consider our iconic prayer, “A Woman of Valor.” It’s rubies for a reason.

Helen Chernikoff is an editor at the Forward. Follow her on Twitter @thesimplechild

Helen Chernikoff is the Forward’s News Editor. She came to the Forward from The Jewish Week, where she served as the first web director and created both a blog dedicated to disability issues and a food and wine website. Before that, she covered the housing, lodging and logistics industries for Reuters, where she could sit at her desk and watch her stories move the stock market. Helen has a Master’s of Public Administration from Columbia University and a BA in History and French from Amherst College. She is also a rabbinical school dropout. Contact her at [email protected] and follow her on Twitter at @thesimplechild.

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