Everybody has read or heard about empowerment, it might sound even more familiar discussing gender equality topics. But, do we know what it actually means? The dictionary defines empowerment as "to give power or authority to; authorize, especially by legal or official means", so why is it so important to empower someone, especially women?
Women are known for being underestimated along all the world's history, it is not a secret that even today they can´t acquire equal treatment as their fellow men. Someone once said “behind every great man there is a woman” and this was not very far from the actual truth. Every day we discover more about how the role of women affected our history for both good and bad. Nevertheless, recently and I mean in this century, society started to give rightful credit for this gender, we are not quite there yet, but we are closer than we´ve ever been. It is because of this, that everybody including men, boys, girls and WOMEN too, have to understand the magnitude that this has. It is not only, speaking how valuable women are, but also to demand for women to have the exact same conditions as men.
We are not aware of the gender pay gap that still exists amongst men and women, which is completely unfair taken into account that a man and a woman with the exact same titles, skills and position do not earn the same amount of money. However, this is not the only problem they face at their workplace. lf we count the many cases for sexual harassments, women who have embraced their maternity and have been fired for doing so (which is illegal by the way) and women who have difficulties obtaining a job because they are being asked how many kids they have (totally inappropriate). And if this is not enough, they are also criticized by society when they make the decision of being in charge economically of the household described as bad mothers. All of these challenges discourage women to be successful in their workplace causing them to dropout or live rather unhappy lives.
However, this is not the only problem. When it comes to education they have a harder time, it is harder for a girl to access school especially in countries such as India. In this country it is considered for men to be much smarter than girls, so they start training for motherhood even if they do not have the slightest interest for it. Without leaving behind the pressure that is put on them to get married since they can barely speak. Or in other countries where religion is used as an excuse for girls to skip education, having a terrible impact on their life forcing them to rely on a man, so basically from their fathers' arms to their husbands (who can be up to thirty years older than her). Secondary education yeah, even harder.
If you thought that discriminating them their whole lives is not bad enough, how about not even allowing them to live such life. Yes, feminicide. For those who are not informed about this phenomenon, it is abortion due to the fact that the gender of the unborn baby is a girl. It is a thing. It has come to be so terrible,that in countries such as China it has caused a terrible gender imbalance making the government make campaigns so people would want to have girls, so begging people to keep their girls. Outrageous!!!
This is why we need gender equality. It is not something that should be in question, it is absurd that we have to ask for it, it should be something to be naturally given to everybody. So, I invite you to tell your children, cousins, and everyone you know to start treating women as their equals in every sense of the word.
So if I have not convinced you yet that we need gender equality, I advise you to enter www.unwomen.org and find out for yourselves all the things I did not mention.
