This year we asked the women who make up the Belle Et Rebelle team what they think of International Women's Rights Day, their vision of femininity, what they like or hate about be a woman. Our visions are different, complementary, that's what makes the beauty of our team.

Severine

"For me, International Women's Day is 365 days a year. It's when I debate with my family, my friends, my boyfriend about the injustices that billions of women experience in the world. It's is when I watch movies made by women, read books written by women, or listen to all-girl band music. Is when I help my sisters and support my friends. Is when I'm a feminist When I discuss feminism the pressure builds, a ton of energy takes hold of my brain and I become passionate and unstoppable. Oftentimes I feel angry at all the injustices I've been through, sometimes once that energy is used up, I feel I feel empty and without strength, but I still feel proud to be a woman, to learn about these injustices and to stand up to our detractors. To be a woman and to be proud, that's a beautiful day for me!

Daniela

"International Women's Day is for me a day where I look forward, while reflecting on the actions of the women who before me have traced the path on which I walk today. It is a day where future and past mix in my head to lead me to reflect on the place that feminism proudly occupies in my life. Each year, I realize that it is important, more than ever, to highlight the obstacles with which we live, because the fight for women's rights is not settled until it is for ALL women."

Anne 

"Each year, I try to redefine my own role as a woman and each year I move a little further away from the one I had forged for myself. The role of “strong” woman that I had given myself, I feel it "old school". I feel like claiming our vulnerability, we have too often stifled it thinking that being a "wonderwoman" is what feminism is. It's wrong. It doesn't matter the role or the labels we "we give ourselves, they end up suffocating us. The older I get, the more I suffocate in this role. This year, I don't want to talk about women but to talk about freedom, the freedom to be, everything simply, whatever gender one identifies with. I'm talking about freedom: I'm a white, straight, middle-class woman living in a rich country….

The facts cannot be denied:

• Nearly one in three women has experienced abuse in her lifetime. Currently, 130 million women worldwide have undergone genital mutilation.
• Each year, approximately 4 million women and girls are sold into marriage, prostitution or slavery.
• Up to 70% of murdered women are murdered by their male partner.
• Rape is a crime of which we only see the tip of the iceberg.
• Gender pay inequalities around the world are still very high. Two-thirds of illiterate people in the world are women 80% of climate-displaced people are girls and women."

Leah

"Four months ago, I woke up with an anxious and almost painful question: What is the thing I love most about being a cisgender woman? 

What is the element that makes me a woman, and therefore I am the most proud? I admit I was taken aback by my own brain. So I started looking, which I had nothing better to do because it was November and the ambient conditions and weather felt like a pile of manure.

I think I'm funny? I like absurd things, I like to make fun of David Goudreault's intonations: seriously pay attention to his tone of voice, you can let out a laugh. I'm a woman who is close to punk culture, I wear ties, I'm redheaded and I listen to Patti Smith, I fall asleep to the sound of rain, and I think I'm someone who is passionate about people who surround it. 

Well, I am someone who loves. But what is the relationship with my status as a woman?? Loving doesn't make me a woman... doesn't categorize me as feminine 

It's not binary. Disappointed, I did like any good young adult and asked my mother. 

My mother who was a sailing boat teacher in 1991 and who picked magic mushrooms, whose body is sculpted by ancient muscles, my mother who always has 6 actions to do at the same time. My mother who now has no time to waste. 

With all her patience, she answered me: I don't know, what I'm most proud of in being a woman, but promised me that she would come back to the subject. She hasn't spoken to me yet. Empty-handed, I turned to my dear colleagues. Some found the answer hard to answer, thought hard about it but found nothing deeply binary. In any case, nothing that cannot belong to a genre.

Until Marie-Ève, whom you surely know, a native of Sainte-Julie Beach, if you hear Celine Dion playing at Belle et Rebelle, it's from her. 

She told me: dress cute.  As simple and natural as that without thinking. Obviously. 

In all her femininity, Marie-Ève prefers her ability to want to make herself pretty. Put on tulle dresses, pantyhose and barrettes. A fairy. Be true to who she is. This is not to weigh the pros and cons of gender injustice or its passionate surge for the speeches of sexist men that we have seen for decades. Powerful men who exploit teenage girls. It's to put on your heels. And that's completely legitimate, because she's true to who she is."