This is why Team Marie Claire thinks marching works

In 10 years time, when people ask you where you were for the biggest international march in history, what will you say?

Like thousands across the world painting their placards and rallying their friends and colleagues right now, we want to say 10 years from now we were there.

Marie Claire, will be joining the Women’s March on Saturday because we want to make a political statement in the most basic of ways, just as countless others have done in civil rights and equality marches before us, people who marched for the rights we now enjoy, but which in 2017 are under threat around the world.

This Saturday 21st - the first day of Donald Trump’s presidency, 200,000 women will take to the streets in Washington. Their aim? ‘To express to the new administration and Congress that women's rights are human rights and our power cannot be ignored".

What initially started out as a grass roots reaction by one grandmother in one American state, against Trump has become a cross-social, global movement with over 600 ‘solidarity’ marches around the world and 17,000 women registered to march in London alone.

So why give up your Saturday to march? Because there comes a stage when sofa politics is not enough and you need to get out there and be counted. You need to go one step further than just ‘liking’ this post, and start doing something.

This march is about more than the election of a misogynistic billionaire to the White House, who openly brags about grabbing women’s private parts for fun; a sexist racist who has used his platform and immense wealth to unleash a tide of discrimination against women, Muslims, immigrants, and the disabled. It’s even about more than saying you disagree with a president who plans to reverse many of the hard won reproductive, and maternity rights introduced for women under Obama such as affordable contraception (with devastating consequences for millions of women).

Marching on Saturday is actually about highlighting the conditions and divisions right now amongst us around the world that put Trump there in the first place. As Emma McNally, one of the main organisers of the London march says: “Its time to get out of our own echo chambers created by social media and the Internet, and get on the streets. Its about opening up conversations, creating the conditions for new networks to emerge.’

And guess what? Protesting works. The past year has been a great year for protests. Brexit, Trump's election, the spread of hate crime, and the attempt of many governments across the world to restrict women’s rights have brought unprecedented numbers of women on to the streets. Last year, in Poland, 100,000 Polish women took to the streets brandishing coat hangers after a petition to totally outlaw abortion was put before the Polish parliament (which would have made ending your own pregnancy punishable with five years in prison). As a result, the proposal was scrapped.

There has never been a better time to make your voice heard than right now.

So if you’re angry that despite the fact that little girls outperform boys at schools and universities across the country, we can still expect to earn 20% less than our male colleagues at work, or you're disappointed that one in four of us will experience domestic violence, or saddened that there are 33 million fewer little girls around the world in primary school than boys, then here’s your chance to do something about it.

Want to join us to show your solidarity? We’ll be assembling here outside the London Marriot Hotel Grosvenor Square at 12pm. The march starts in nearby Grosvenor square W1 at 12.30pm and finishes with a rally in Trafalgar square from 2pm to 3.30pm.

Please share this post with your friends and follow our Facebook live streams throughout the day here . Men and kids are welcome too!

For more information visit: womensmarchlondon.com