Firsts

Women make up more than half of the world's population, yet all too often they are still treated like second class citizens.  Many amazing accomplishments over the years have been by women and TIME is recognizing that with a list.  Specifically, it's a list of women who have been first at something, and the fortysix people listed include a mixture of liberals and conservatives, young and old, as well as different races and ethnicities.

Now I don't have anything to do with TIME magazine, and I am not writing this to promote them, but I did want you to look at who they selected.  Their complete list and a bit about each is HERE.  Most of the names I immediately recognized, but I must admit to not knowing a lot about some of them. The list includes Katharine Jefferts Schori, Nikki Haley, Barbara Walters, Madeleine Albright, Ellen DeGeneres, and Janet Yellen.  Also Rita Moreno, Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, Michelle Phan, Kellyanne Conway, and Rachel Maddow.  I like the diversity of jobs too - everything from a bishop to a comedian to a governor and some news reporters.

I have had the great honor of meeting some of these women and I'd sure love to meet more of them.  In case you haven't figured this out yet, I am quite a fan of people who make a positive difference in our world.  This isn't a perfect list by my standards - I might not have included a few who are there, and I can think of other great women who were the first to do various things.  What about you?  Can you think of some living women who were first at something that should be remembered in a list like this? 

Please hold off on any criticism about not mentioning men.  It seems to me that men are always getting recognized.  It's about time we did the same for women!