oN female icons

March 7, 2025.

Tomorrow is International Women's Day.

I've had philosophical difficulties with the concept in the past, mostly when it resembles a hollow annual observance instead of a fruitful discussion about women's liberation. That said, there are better and worse ways to engage so this year I've decided to spark discussion by sharing my personal top 5 female icons.

This was an interesting exercise. Pop culture doesn't flash on my radar, so that rules out cultural bellwethers like Taylor Swift or Beyonce. Instead I've opted for women whose courage or intellectual armoury make my heart swell with admiration.

Below are my chosen five.

I'm curious to hear everyone else's female icons. Men especially, who would you add to this list?

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5 - Ayman Hirsi Ali

Once labelled "the most important public intellectual probably ever to come out of Africa", Hirsi Ali is a titan of women's rights advocacy, especially in the context of religious oppression. Reading her work The Challenge of Dawa taught me a great deal more than studying the Qur’an. At 5 years old she suffered female genital mutilation and as a young adult fled to Europe to escape a forced marriage. She is now one of the world’s most renowned voices for the self-determination of Muslim women and a bastion of clear thinking on the paradox of tolerance, a theme we would do well to remember today.

4 - Angela Merkel

Myopia will claim her over-reliance on Russian imports, particularly gas and coal, exposed Europe to the tense mire in which it currently finds itself. Those with sharper memories, however, will remember the doctorate in quantum chemistry as a deeply principled and unifying leader who steered the EU through a period of high political turbulence. Championing a strong renewable energy transition as well as a foreign policy of Wandel durch Handel (“change through trade”), Merkel stood for pragmatism, even if the latter strategy was glaringly imperfect on occasion. Her televised address at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic remains one of the most stirring speeches I’ve watched in my life.

3 - Lee Miller

I have unparalleled respect for people who pivot away from a successful career, to then reach even higher summits in a new vocation. Subsequent to working as a New York fashion model, Miller then became a war photographer during WW2, capturing some of the most evocative images of the Holocaust’s horrors. Her creativity shone light upon humanity’s darkest moments, even as she herself was stepping through barely-deserted Nazi premises. Miller’s intense bravery is captured beautifully in the eponymously named film Lee.

2 - Madalyn Murray O’Hair

O’Hair matched a ferocious character with striking intelligence, able to swat away arguments for compulsory prayer and Bible reading in schools during the lawsuit that made her famous. O’Hair was the founder of American Atheists at a time when the common view regarded religiosity and morality as having a causal relationship. While she did hold some unpalatable opinions in her later years, whenever I reread her core essays or rewatch her interviews I always marvel at the sheer dominance of a woman who defiantly trampled on society’s expectations of her. Her life came to a tragic end when she was kidnapped along with her son and granddaughter, and brutally murdered.

1 - My Mother, Paulette

A personal, if obvious, choice but there is no female figure I’ve encountered in my life who better embodies the qualities of fierce independence, resourcefulness and determination. I’ve long encouraged her to pen an autobiography, such has been the unique complexion of her life. It is her I celebrate on my birthday each year and it is her for whom I would eat cement. Her extraordinary standards and persistent indignation at patriarchal social structures have made me who I am.

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