Mother's Day - the Albanian people's perspective on Women's Day

The homemakers looking forward to the bright future ahead.

(Article written on March 8th 2018)

Why is the 8^th of March seen as Mother’s Day rather than Women’s Day in Albanian popular culture and who should we really celebrate?

The question poses two issues for analysis.

The first issue provides us with some historical background. A “holiday” of pure socialist/communist roots, the International Women’s Day was first proposed at the International Socialist Women Conference in August 1910. Scheduled mainly for the last Sunday of February, it took several years until the “holiday” was finally settled on March 8^th. The date coincides with Saint Petersburg’s textile worker’s revolt on March 8^th, 1917, as per the Gregorian calendar, a date that is also considered as the start of the bitter Bolshevik coup d’état. The “holiday” is closely tied to larger socialist progressive movements of the times and the push to ruin empires, traditions and values inherited through the centuries. It was these same movements that would very soon bring to the stage totalitarian and dictatorial empires of their own, empires that would drench most of the 20^th century in blood in many corners of the world.

"The light of new days" making way for women from the kitchen of their families to the railroads of the proletariat.

In 1977, the United Nations suggested March 8^th was proclaimed the UN Day for women's rights and world peace (!). Two logical fallacies were committed here: first, why should we ever care to "celebrate women" on the exact day when a bloody coup d’état began, and second, does the UN know that Marx believed all developments in human society come through conflict, not peace, the same way the USSR came to be? The women’s revolt of March 8^th 1917 and peace on earth are two mutually exclusive concepts. Are we to understand that the only conflict allowed is that led by socialists and mindless mobs?

The women who gave us this “holiday” contributed simultaneously – though maybe not so consciously or willingly – to the establishment of regimes that caused the disfiguration of human dignity and the death of millions of persons around the world, on-going to this day in countries like North Korea. A good number of them were politically aware and desired these developments to take place, whereas the greater, misinformed, easily-manipulated and often greedy and punk-like mob rushed into dressing those leaders in godlike features, praising them as their saviours from any distress.

In conclusion to this first issue, I would like to say woman had always been and is still celebrated by her Creator and loved ones, first and foremost as an individual, with the important role of constituting half of the human population. The women’s “holiday” in question does not in any measure celebrate her value as an individual, but rather as part of a shapeless mass, with her powers easily manipulated by the “masters of puppets” of her times. The day does not celebrate the dignity of woman, or the value of each individual woman as a mother, a daughter, a sister, a friend or whatever she may be by profession . The day celebrates the exploitation of women at the turn of the century to the benefit of establishing regimes that caused and still cause violence upon thousands of women – and men – who did not and do not see their value in the masses, but in themselves, their loved ones, their nation, and their Lord.

The second issue I have with the “holiday” is that communism - the regime partially made possible due to those women who gave us March 8^th - came to Albania in its usual stealthy and unexpected manner, with plenty of factors paving the way for 50 years of darkness. March 8^th was, of course, promoted by the establishment back then, a system that had no interest in the traditional Albanian woman who preferred far more the housewife’s life to the “progress” of building apartment blocks and railways. However, more free labour meant more ants in the colony of our ant-queen leader.

Albanian communist propaganda on March 8th, 1977.

This “emancipation” did not, however, affect the essence of the Albanian woman, to whom the priority was her family, as is considerably the case even today. With all its propaganda and slogans and posters of women with man muscles, Albanian popular culture never chose to celebrate the woman as a mason, a miner, a wielder, or whatever else. Our popular culture chose to celebrate the woman as a mother, imposing the terminology of mother’s day over the “holiday”, even in the mouths of the leading elite itself. It was an unspoken victory of a repressed people who remained untamed in the face of the communist fist.

Artistic impression of Illyrian Queen Teuta, one of our first "emancipated" ancestors of the female gender. She ruled over the Ardiaei tribe by the Adriatic shores.

I cannot help but think – did this distinction of celebrating the mother as a role and not woman as a gender actually express the unconscious refusal of communism from the “archaic” Albanian mind and soul? Did we feel that the simple fact of being a woman has no celebration merit in itself, just as being a man, an Albanian, an Arab, or anything else is devoid of merit if you don't contribute character, honour and value to the identities you are born in? Was this our silent effort to refuse the mob mentality, to express ourselves as individuals, to celebrate a person who means something to us rather than a faceless mob? Were they suspicious of the abandonment of a truth that has proven itself true for thousands of years – that bringing a person to life far surpasses the importance of building any type of apartment block or any other kind of edifice?

When we say “Mother’s Day”, we are celebrating a concrete person in our own lives, a person who is our origins, a person inseparable from our own self on a deeply personal basis, a person you love tangibly, a person you wish all happiness to and who reciprocates, a person who is your primary role model. On the other hand, when we say “Women’s Day”, we are speaking abstractly, celebrating a mass-based concept, not taking into consideration the fact that womanhood is simply born into, not gained, with “exemplars” not each worthy of taking pride in. We are thus overlooking the fact that the mass means nothing to most of us, as long as it has no face and no merit that we have seen or witnessed.

For the more "military" minded, here is Shote Galica on her husband's side, fighting with him for the protection and freedom of Kosovo's Albanians and their land.

This March 8^th consider moving out of the shapeless mass and follow the “misinterpretation” provided you by your people. Celebrate the tangible person who has impacted your life since your very first day among the land of men. Even the least deserving of them are still the earthly reason why you are here and why you can project life onto generations after you're gone. Then see if you can go on celebrating – throughout the year – a sister, a grandmother, a friend, an artist, a teacher, or any special woman who deserves celebration. Happy Mother’s Day everyone, every day!

And finally, the ultimate Albanian mythological woman, Rozafa. The legend combines the prophecy of a pagan sage as to the only way for the Illyrian Shkodra castle to stand demanding human - woman - sacrifice. Rozafa's and her husband's purity of heart, bravery of spirit and loyalty to a sacred oath sorted her out as the perfect sacrifice. Before being buried within the castle walls, she demanded half her body stayed out as long as she could survive, to make sure she could feed her infant son. Look it up! Did our ancestors mean to tell us in myth that it takes divine mandate and human free will for civilizations to stand in time? Could the sacrifices and role of women as at least their husband's compliments in valour be better, though bitterly, shown than in Rozafa's legend?