Youth talk

The word ‘feminist’ has received a lot of hatred recently, since people equate it to bra-burning and the idea of women who hate men. Firstly, burning bras is like burning money; those things cost a fortune. Secondly, the hatred of men is misandry, not feminism.

Recently, Emma Watson pointed out one of the key issues at hand: ‘the more I have spoken about feminism the more I have realised that fighting for women’s rights has too often become synonymous with man-hating’. Simply put, the idea behind feminism is that women and men should have equal rights and opportunities. Easy as that.

Women are often derided for being ‘bossy’ or ‘shrill’ when we would never use the same word for a man. We teach girls to compete with other girls for the attention of boys. In many parts of the world, young girls are forced into marriage.
 
Feminism is about fighting against the inequality between sexes. Our gender should not have a bearing on the jobs that we are offered, or the opportunities we are afforded. However, this is not the reality of our world. Women are still paid 77 cents to every dollar a man is paid for doing the same job, and this disparity only widens with age.

This situation has to change. Society will only make real progress when all members of society are treated as equals. It is not progress when 50 per cent of the population does not benefit from it.

* See Bridget in Bahrain: P14