International Women's Day: Reflections of Patriarchy

“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.”- Audre Lorde

These words hum through my every day. They are woven into the fabric of what we do at Lighthouse. I run a radical bookshop because I believe books & community are powerful in ending oppression.

Monday morning we found the bookshop had been vandalized - nothing irreparable, just a demoralizing waste of energy in the clean up- and it was a harsh reminder, on International Women's Day, of how fearful some are of spaces like ours. Well, we're not going anywhere.

We will continue fight for a world free of racism, borders, underfunded & undervalued healthcare, child poverty and economic injustice. We demand an end to rape culture and ageism, ableism, queerphobia, fatphobia and plain old misogyny. We call for for environmental justice and international solidarity. And that's just for starters. Because fuck, look at the alternative!

This missive might not have made it out in time for International Women's Day but we hope that every day we are making space for the stories of women, our histories & our imaginings. We're also always saving space on our shelves for those women past, present & future, who had their voices stolen, histories erased & imaginings crushed.

The patriarchy will always pit us against each other with manufactured scarcity. A feminism fit for purpose will always fight for the safety, dignity and joy of society's most vulnerable women. For the past few years a vocal, well-connected reactionary movement has derailed progress & conversations on myriad feminist issues, including trans rights, domestic abuse, refugee women, systemic racism and encroachments on reproductive rights. They have done so by directing unrelenting bigotry at our trans community, and trans women especially. A feminism fit for purpose doesn't fight for the scraps offered by our oppressors - it demands the whole bloody pie. Here's a list with some of the writings that inspire our feminism & activism.

This Women's History Month we've got a heck of a feminist line up.

We kick off the 3-part launch of Disturbing The Body.

Part 1 with Chịkọdịlị Emelụmadụ & Verity Holloway, who explore women's bodily experiences by subverting, fusing and playing with memoir & genre fiction - like fantasy, and horror.

Part 2, hosted by Five Leaves Bookshop, talking about feminism and disability with Louise Kenward and Laura Elliott.

Part 3 hosted by Housmans Bookshop, explores feminism & body politics with Abi Hynes & Irenosen Okojie.

We're then launching lesbian romcom The Split on the 24th March and we've curated a complementary collection of fictional women loving women.

And that tremendous week will end with our Women In Translation bookclub host Annie Rutherford launching a translation of her own! We'll have chat, live music & readings for The Peacock, March 25th!