BRATTLEBORO — Not every milestone makes the news of course, but some deserve public notice.
We hope that, just as many of you helped mark our 40th anniversary, you'll also come celebrate our 25th Annual Women's Film Festival in March (check out womensfilmfestival.org).
This month, however, we reached a subtle but no-less-significant marker: five years ago, we changed our name from Women's Crisis Center to Women's Freedom Center, and at the start of this new year, it's worth revisiting why.
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At first, not everyone in the community supported the change. Some worried that after so many decades as the Crisis Center, survivors wouldn't know how to reach us.
Calls did not drop off, however; survivors proved their ongoing resourcefulness and still found our number. Noticeably, too, they themselves like the new name for affirming what they're really after.
Others concerned about the name change suggested it wouldn't reflect what we actually do. Some also felt the name just shouldn't have - or no longer needed - such a radical tinge to it.
While we respect that well-meaning allies can disagree, it's important to note that early on, the Women's Crisis Center itself was a radical name. Because the first work of our foremothers was to break a vast historic silence: in the early 1970s, even naming the problem of domestic and sexual violence was a revolutionary act.
They knew that language has power, that shifts in language create shifts in thinking. The word “crisis” helped them get heard as they formed a movement.
Decades later, though, our culture is so used to hearing about violence against women that “crisis” might sometimes read as “stasis.”
Our present task is to still to be heard, to break through all the barriers to women's progress.
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Yes, there have been successes, and our allies include more men in each generation.
But as long as women are less safe than men, we are less free.
As long as we're less respected, less elected, less hired, and less paid, we're also less free - both to share in and to help shape the world.
That's why the word “freedom” has actually always reflected the many facets of our work as well as the rich conversations we have with our community.
If that most-iconic American word does somehow sound radical only when it's next to the word “women,” it speaks volumes about what's still missing - and why the new name is so necessary.
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Not surprisingly, the dialogue on this topic among advocates and board members beforehand was some of the most potent discussion we'd ever had with one another.
Like any long work in progress, social justice builds on some blend of vision and re-vision: “crisis” was quite an arresting word once, when applied to women; now “freedom” helps us pause again and re-examine what's left to be done.
And in that vein, we appreciate the thoughtful voices of those who came to our Unpacking the Gender Box series, and there's another chance to catch these films at The Root Social Justice Center in Brattleboro: Wednesday, Feb. 3 (The Mask You Live In) and Wednesday, Feb. 17 (Miss Representation).
Both films start at 6 p.m. All are welcome, including parents and high-school students.
So it's 2016, and the work to make a better world for women and girls goes on. As always, our goal isn't just an absence of crisis but the presence of liberation for everyone.
Everyone counts, and every step matters, because public or not, it links us all to a higher cause. And not until women's freedom is universal can we stop having centers to help make that point.