International Women’s Day

Surely in the year 2020 we shouldn’t be talking about trying to get to a society that treat women equally as men right?

This is not a minority group matter right? There are at least as many women as there are men on earth. So, setting the physical differences aside, it is nothing of disgraceful, that women are still having to fight for equality

”Best woman engineer”, “best woman doctor”? Why????? If a woman is excelling and she is the best, she is the best engineer, doctor etc, PERIOD.

Unfortunately, we live in a world that sometimes baffles! Recently I read about a supposed “superforecaster” in the UK who stated that based on an IQ testing result in the US that showed African Americans with a low IQ, it is conclusive that they are not as smart as whites and that Asians are the smartest. To begin with, an average African American child will spend most of his/her formative years in poverty, trying to get decent food, while the average Caucasian child takes holidays around the world, seeing and learning. If all children grow up under similar circumstances, with a support network and society that see them as the same, the outcome will be very similar. In any case, only an idiot will seek to compare IQ along the lines of ethnicity or race, given the sample available in the US for instance, is weighted in favour of the predominant population

The same applies to women: globally, with fewer women being afforded the opportunity to go to school or live freely, it is reprehensible to denigrate the achievement of women.

We will only know we have made a difference, when women no longer have to fight for equal treatment. It has to start from the grassroots though: girls getting the same education, freedom, opportunities as boys and developing skills, taking up jobs and securing salaries without discrimination. Having an office of 100 staff with 80 men and 20 women but expecting 10 leaders of that office to comprise of 5 men and 5 women is not seeking equality but seeking preferential treatment. That has not helped the cause women have been trying to champion to date. A lot more needs to be done for young girls to ensure they progress unhindered (and not forced into roles society have decided to set aside for women. They must be encouraged to be whatever they want to be: engineers, lawyers etc.)

It is really sad that this is still an issue. A clear objective to eliminate ill-treatment of women, globally, needs to be championed by everyone and achieved urgently. We should not be talking about equality for women in the 21st century; we should be talking about how it was achieved and looking back to what the world used to be…

Collectively we are simply not doing enough! I see all the posts celebrating Women’s Day and all that. Fine, let’s celebrate it, BUT we need to act! We have to do more. Much more. Everyone seems keen on telling women what to do, what they can’t do with their body etc. (using all sorts of excuses; religion etc.). We must change. We all need to do more in order to achieve equality for women. Enough is enough!