If Only You Let Me Work...

When I was in kindergarten we were asked to draw a picture of what we wanted to be when we grow up and so I drew a doctor while the boy next to me drew an astronaut.  He looked up, saw my drawing and made a face that said: She’s a girl, she can’t become a doctor.  Flash-forward eight years and we are in class raising our hands to volunteer to help set up props for a play. My teacher called on five boys and me. When we got to the stage room all the boys went straight for all the big, heavy props, leaving me with a cardboard cutout of a snowman. “Hey Girl, don’t break a nail moving that heavy snowman,” a boy yelled.

Girls and women, if you must consider the difference, have always been thought less than men in jobs, school, and just about everything in life. It is a testament to the power of institutional sexism that women, despite making up 51% of the population, are a minority group.  It has been almost tradition for men to belittle women for their own comfort and to prove that they are more superior. I know that times have changed and women and men are now equal, but are they truly equal?  Women often work more than men, yet are paid less. Take Lilly Ledbetter for example. Ledbetter worked as production supervisor, not long ago, at a Goodyear tire plant in Alabama. She filed an equal-pay lawsuit regarding pay discrimination, since she discovered that a man doing the same work as her was getting a significantly greater pay. Just because Ledbetter is a women doesn’t mean she’s any less human, and Lilly made sure that wouldn’t happen again. Her proposal was a success; getting a law regarding pay discrimination, signed by President Barack Obama in 2009.

Discrimination against women started from for them the moment they are born. In many parts of the world, people put babies up for adoption just on the fact that they are a girl.  Some 50,000 female fetuses are aborted every month in India. Baby girls are often killed at birth, either thrown into rivers, or left to die in garbage dumps. It's estimated that one million girls in India “disappear” every year. But discriminating doesn’t stop there, it continues throughout their life. During childhood, many young girls suffer from educational disadvantage. As it so happens, girls in third world countries usually don't even attend school due to the belief that they are only good for cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the kids. The people who restrict girls (usually men) are so simple minded that they can't even see that some educated girls grow into the world's greatest leaders. Indira Gandhi, India's Prime Minster from 1966–77 and again from 1980 until her assassination in 1984, was a very powerful women who lead India. Gandhi became known for her political ruthlessness and unprecedented centralization of power. She did the most unexpected thing a women could do, rise to power. This clearly showed many that women are not their slaves that they could push around.

For many girl's adolescent years onwards abuse and discriminating of women only gets worse.  Adolescent girls are, typically, more prone to depression and being sexually and/or physically abused by men. On average, 1 out of 5 girls have been abused in some way during their teen years. Among women who report having been mistreated in their lifetimes, 54% say that it occurred before the age of 18. As in comparison to men, it is minimal. Statistics show that neglect continues as they grow up. Also, girls receive less food, healthcare and fewer vaccinations overall than boys. Not much changes as they become women. Tradition, in India, calls for women to eat last, often reduced to picking over the leftovers from the men and boys.

When a boy is born in most developing countries, friends and relatives exclaim congratulations. A son means insurance. He will inherit his father's property and get a job to help support the family. When a girl is born, the reaction is very different. Some women weep when they find out their baby is a girl because, to them, a daughter is just another expense. Her place is in the home, not in the world of men. In some parts of India, it's traditional to greet a family with a newborn girl by saying, "The servant of your household has been born." Though times are changing and more and more women are taking a stand when they feel like they are being discriminated, women discrimination is a major problem in our world.