I’m just a girl, sings Gwen Stefani. Right. Let’s start right there.

Let’s begin there, reclaim our voices, and sing loudly. Our voices are needed, now more than ever.

If we allowed the recent decision by once-well-respected legal justices to stand in the way of our feelings of injustice and effects of amorality, it would be difficult to find our voice in anything. If we permitted the presence of guns in our nation to feed our fears that we might not make it back to our homes at the end of each day, we might just curl up and cry in the fetal position. If we sat down and cried when we heard the pernicious lies and toxicity spew from the likes of Tucker Carlson and Fox and Friends, we women might just quietly take our seat, put our knees together and shut up while they espoused the rants of the day.

If we waited to be validated by all things external – from corporate America to universities conferring degrees to institutions endowing us with permission, we would die waiting.

Or, we would just fall silent and die a little more inside each day.

That’s not going to happen. Here’s why:

We are American women. We have freedom to express what is most in our hearts and on our minds. We have the right to protect what we hold near and dear, covet the vulnerable animals and scream loudly on behalf of the lesser-privileged.

By virtue of direct knowledge and indirect suspicion, I already know that millions of American women with hurting hearts, confused minds and deflated spirits, have been and will continue to be speaking out in quantities and volume louder than ever before.

Women – most – are intuitive by nature. We smell threats like a rotting carcass downwind. We know bulls*!t when we hear it. And we rise up with our hair on end when we are deeply offended.

The belligerent billionaire and his followers – for now – may have done some palpable damage during their time conning America out of the Oval Office. The January 6 Insurrection has terrified anyone with a moral compass or semblance of ethical behavior. We may have been deeply insulted by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision and ensuing threats to further strip away human rights from any segment of the population that is not a privileged white male. We may be intimidated, temporarily, by the incessant push to arm more Americans with means to kill than provide means to protect. And we may be exhausted from trying to save more dogs and cats from death-by-shelter in the beleaguered Southern states, but we get back up the next morning and try to save just one more.

While harm and insults are bandied about against snowflake liberals and cancel culture like shots of cheap tequila in a Wisconsin bar on a Friday night, I feel confident that as we move forward, the sisterhood is stronger than any daggers being thrown our way. I feel certain that women are stronger than some of lesser intellectual capacity would like to believe.  I know women are — and will continue — to speak out for injustice, human rights, the right to live without fear of violence, and any other intrinsic right to live our full lives and that of others, as they continue to come under assault.

The collective voice of women everywhere will remind all of us that our life force is stronger than any harm recently inflicted. We may have suffered a setback, we may have just endured recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions purporting to control what we do with our very own bodies, but by no means will we fall silent. There are calls to make and protests to attend — for the good of the environment and wildlife, on behalf of women’s rights, on behalf of equality and just plain on behalf of all that is just, right and moral.

It’s up to us women and enlightened men to speak out — one voice at a time.

Sticks and stones may break our bones – but misogyny can never hurt us – unless we give it our permission to do so.