This International Women’s Day, reject the politics of ‘protection’

International Women’s Day has long been a time for both celebration and reflection. In 2025, the theme ‘Accelerate Action’ calls for urgency in tackling gender inequality. Yet, it can be argued that globally, women’s rights are not accelerating forward but are being reversed — often under the guise of protection. Protection of culture, protection of values, and protection of women. A gendered regression sees political leaders justifying the rollback of rights through narratives of care. The framing of women as needing protection may be a thinly veiled attempt to reassert control over women’s bodies, choices, and futures.

Protection as paternalism

To protect someone against their will means stripping them of choice, highlighting the authoritarian nature of his paternalism. From this perspective, women are incapable of making the ‘right’ choice, meaning the state must intervene to make it for them.

The weaponisation of women’s rights under the guise of protection can be seen in the United States, where the overturning of Roe v Wade dismantled abortion rights in the name of safeguarding women. For decades, the American right has asserted that abortion bans protect women from themselves, expressing the paternalistic logic that abortion is inherently traumatic and harmful to women, thus they must be saved from making a decision they may regret. During the 2024 US election, Donald Trump, a man found liable for sexual assault, accused of rape by multiple women, and recorded boasting about grabbing women’s genitals without their consent, positioned himself as “the protector of women”. A grotesque irony which cannot be overstated. The most chilling moment came when Trump declared that he would protect women “whether they like it or not”. To protect someone against their will means stripping them of choice, highlighting the authoritarian nature of his paternalism. From this perspective, women are incapable of making the ‘right’ choice, meaning the state must intervene to make it for them. This narrative ignores evidence showing that bans do not prevent the occurrence of abortions but only make the practice dangerous. Data reveals that restricting abortion increases maternal mortality rates, financial hardship for women, and gender inequality. However, facts do not fit the narrative of protection that conservatives use to justify state control over women’s bodies – if anything, facts directly contradict it.

Multiple states now enforce near-total abortion bans, often without exceptions for rape or incest, denying life-saving healthcare and forcing women to carry non-viable pregnancies. Doctors fear treating complications with the knowledge that necessary care could have legal consequences. Some are inclined to believe that abortion bans are not protection, but state violence disguised as care.

The American anti-abortion movement extends beyond reproductive rights, fuelling a broader backlash against gender equality as conservatives are now targeting contraception, sex education, and protections against gender-based violence. Trump’s allies, including Vice President JD Vance, have expressed disdain for working women, promoting policies pushing women to prioritise childbearing over their careers. The movement claiming to protect women is the same one that is diminishing equal pay, workplace harassment laws, and domestic violence protections. Overturning Roe v Wade set a global precedent for the erosion of gender equality, causing a reactionary, anti-abortion movement worldwide, influencing policy in countries such as Poland, El Salvador, and Nigeria. This shows the powerful influence of US policy, demonstrating that if the US continues to weaken women’s rights, other nations will be emboldened to do the same, accelerating a worldwide repeal that leaves fewer and fewer women with true autonomy.

Protection as tradition

under the banner of protecting cultural identity, politicians are now seeking to strip women and girls of their right to bodily integrity.

In The Gambia, the narrative of protection has been deployed in a chilling, different way with lawmakers recently voting to advance legislation to reverse the ban on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), arguing that the ban violates cultural and religious values. FGM has affected 76% of Gambian women aged 15 to 49, causing immense physical suffering, long-term health complications, and psychological trauma. Yet, under the banner of protecting cultural identity, politicians are now seeking to strip women and girls of their right to bodily integrity.

Positioning FGM as an integral part of Gambian culture ignores the reality that culture evolves and should never be an excuse to legitimise the suffering of half the population. More worryingly, the push to reinstate FGM is not occurring in isolation but is part of a broader trend of sacrificing women’s rights under the pretext of preserving tradition. This rhetoric is gaining traction beyond The Gambia in countries such as Sudan and Indonesia, threatening to undo decades of progress made by activists who have fought to eradicate this inhumane practice.

Protection as erasure

If The Gambia’s attempts to justify FGM in the name of tradition are a warning, then Afghanistan provides a bleak insight into the depths of an extreme patriarchal dystopia. Since the Taliban seized power in 2021, women have been systematically erased from public life under the guise of ‘protecting their dignity’ and upholding ‘Islamic values.’ However, this protection is nothing more than a violent erasure of their humanity.

Women have been prohibited from secondary and higher education, dismissed from careers in education and medicine, and banned from most jobs, including humanitarian work, leaving them economically dependent on male relatives. Although, the Taliban’s policies extend beyond education and employment. Women are forbidden from leaving their homes without a male guardian and have been banned from public spaces, including parks, gyms, beauty salons, and even public transportation in certain areas. They are required to wear full-body coverings, facing arrests, beatings, or worse if they refuse to comply. Reports indicate that women who attempt to defy these rules have been detained in so-called ‘morality centres’ where they are subjected to physical abuse. Nevertheless, the Taliban persists in its narrative that these restrictions are for women’s own good, implying that women are safer when they are invisible, their dignity is upheld by their exclusion, and their protection requires absolute submission. Through implementing these policies, the Taliban have rendered women powerless, taking the concept of ‘protection’ to its most dystopian form.

A false sense of security

International Women’s Day in the UK is often marked by celebrations of progress. However, British women should not be fooled into thinking their rights are secure. The UK is not immune to the global regression in women’s rights, clearly demonstrated by the increasing criminalisation of abortion.

Recently, the UK has seen a dramatic rise in abortion-related prosecutions, with more women being investigated, prosecuted, and imprisoned for self-induced abortions in the past two years than in the previous century.

While abortion has been legal in Britain since 1967, it remains a criminal offence under the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act. This means that abortion is not a legal right but merely an exception that can be revoked. Recently, the UK has seen a dramatic rise in abortion-related prosecutions, with more women being investigated, prosecuted, and imprisoned for self-induced abortions in the past two years than in the previous century. Some have been arrested after experiencing miscarriages, while others have faced police investigations simply for seeking reproductive healthcare.

The UK’s political landscape also mirrors the growing anti-choice sentiment seen in the US. Conservative MPs have repeatedly attempted to lower the legal abortion limit from 24 weeks to 22 weeks, which if successful, could pave the way for stricter restrictions. At the same time, telemedicine abortion services, which expanded abortion access during the Covid pandemic, are under threat from lawmakers who argue that they make abortion ‘too easy.’ These trends indicate that Britain may not be as progressive one may think. The criminalisation of women for reproductive choices may already be upon us.

A future in chains or a future of change?

Globally, women’s rights are threatened under the pretext of protection. Whether framed as safeguarding morality, preserving culture, or ensuring dignity, the goal remains the same: control. The fight for gender equality was never won, only postponed, and as old battles resurface, the responsibility falls to us to ensure that progress is not erased. This is why International Women’s Day 2025 cannot simply be a celebration. The irony of this year’s theme, ‘Accelerate Action,’ is stark. While women are fighting for progress worldwide, their rights are actively being reversed. True action requires more than symbolism; it demands resistance, change, and unwavering solidarity with women everywhere.