Leading feminist Jude Kelly, who founded the Women of the World (WOW) festival has said that the UK needs its very own women’s party.
Speaking ahead of WOW (which is the UK’s biggest women’s festival, and is brimming with talks, gigs and activities all for and about women), Jude said that this year’s edition is going to be political, because, well, ‘This country has a complicated attitude towards women in power.
‘It must have, otherwise it wouldn’t be 26th in the world in terms of women’s representation. That’s a bit of an indication.’
So, to topple the inequality which means that among other things, it’ll take 70 years for the gender pay gap to disappear, she’s been wondering ‘What it would be like if you started up a party for women.’
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She told The Telegraph that the party would be much like the Green party in that it’d be raising awarenss as opposed to actually getting into power: ‘If you take the Greens, they’re never going to run the government but they’re successful in raising awareness about issues and that changes the climate.’
That said, in Sweden, the feminist party has come to power so they can actually do things like propose policies in actual parliament as opposed to spending their time trying to get politicians (most of them, sadly, men) to take on their policies.
But like, even at the lowest level, if there’s a Justice for Men and Boys’ party there should probably be one for women, who bear the brunt of gender equality just a smidgeon more than men...
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While Jude admitted that she wouldn’t be starting the party herself, there’s some political hope in the form of none other than, um, Paloma Faith.
The singer, who is way popular with women, and has recently spoken out about the ways women are ‘suppressed’, could potentially mobilise all of her London and Brighton women fans to go full-on lefty as her opening act will be, um, Owen Jones.
No, he’s not a new tween sensation, he’s a socialist commentator who wrote the book Chavs and The Establishment. He told Time Out: ‘I guess she has fears about the rise of UKIP, and she’s worried some of her fans are turning to UKIP and she’s kind of interested in the old tradition, that used to be more commonplace in the ’70s and ’80s, of music and politics linking up.’
Now imagine what would happen if just one member of One Direction told people to go out and vote come 7 May…
Women of the World Festival takes place in London, like, now until Sunday
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.