Make room for women

Every year I find myself saying: Yeah, right, it’s Women’s Day again, but I must confess I say it with little conviction. This because I am against these annual holiday-celebrations which seem to have by now only a commercial value, important for flower sellers and restaurants offering fixed-menus for girls-only dinners.

This, however, does not mean I am not convinced of the need for women to have are greater role in our society, one based purely on merit and the principles we women bring forward and that often are a check on the ones men typically champion. It should be thanks to these that we hold important positions and not just because they are imposed by mandatory quotas for women.

The idea of quotas for women is a tricky question as demonstrated by the polemics that arose in response to obligation to have them in wine associations. In Italy, we typically need a law or regulation to ensure something for which only common sense is really needed. And I am proud to say that at DoctorWine we have never needed to have quotas for women and, in fact, if things go on the way are now we may need quotas for men. Just look at our masthead and you’ll see what I mean.

On the editorial board the women (Iolanda and I) outnumber the men (the Boss) 2-1, even if it is true that Daniele is worth twice as much. Then among our collaborators, there are Riccardo Viscardi and Dario Cappelloni, the deputy editors of our Wine Guide, along with historic contributors like Vinogodi, Francesco Annibali and Vignadelmar, whereas in the other side we have Chiara Giovoni, Livia Belardelli, Chiara Giannotti, Katiuscia Rotoloni, Rosanna Ferraro, Antonella Amodio, Valeria Cesari and Alessandra Ruggi.

And then if we want to expand our staff to include those who handle finances and organize events, we have our sole administrator Marina Thompson, organizer Elisabetta Solinas and graphic designer Stefania Serra.

All things considered, we can easily say that DoctorWine has a solid female backbone. In fact, you could almost say that we are a women’s wine magazine.