A brief look on gender equality

Hello :)

In this second entry I wanted to talk about a daily situation of society that especially affects women. Guess what it is? Yes, gender equality or even more precise, gender inequality!

But why this topic? Because incredibly all the women I know, regardless of their age, social class, country of residence, skin color or religion have been victims of gender inequality, directly or indirectly, but mostly directly. And the true is that this is a global issue, and not only my opinion on the matter can verify this fact, but the statistics worldwide on the participation and role of us women, show alarming results. For example:

Discriminatory teaching practices and education materials produce gender gaps in learning and skills development. As a result, nearly 1 in 4 girls between the ages of 15 and 19 are neither employed nor in education or training – compared to 1 in 10 boys (UNICEF, 2021).

In the first quarter of 1979, median weekly earnings for men age 16 and over working full time was $408, compared to $251 for women in the US. That is, women's weekly earnings were 61.5% of men's weekly earnings. There has been some progress over the years, and in the third quarter of 2020 women's weekly earnings were 81.7% of men's weekly earnings (Sheth, S., Hoff, M., Ward, M., Tyson, T., 2021).

It is necessary increasing young people's awareness of and interest in the importance of gender equality linked to the political empowerment of women, as women should have participation and representation in the policies making process.

So, it is clearly noticed that gender inequality could be present in many life areas, which is really revealing as it shows how human beings are conditioned by their gender! Like, I don’t know how to feel about it sometimes… it is a shocking reality to face.

My experience?

It is very difficult and frustrating to think of a single experience in which I have felt less appreciated because of being a woman. But, for this occasion I want to mention an unfair situation that I lived during the past year, while I was doing practices of a technology in order to graduate from this. And yes, this happens even during the current pandemic! As the COVID-19 outbreak exacerbates existing inequalities for women and girls across every sphere; from health and the economy, to security and social protection (UN, 2021).

The story is this: Due to the type of technology I was studying, I had to do an internship for 6 months in an office in charge of human talent management. The first week I got on well and I felt very comfortable with the functions assigned to me, but at the second week of work, one of my bosses hired another person (a man) to work hand in hand with me, and I remember that things were not the same again, because they began to make me do mostly "women's things", such as answering calls and filing, while my partner was assigned, most of the days, to do more administrative activities, that I was also in the ability of performing well. And despite the fact that we talked about this situation with my immediate bosses, they didn’t see the problem of dividing the activities to us by our “role” as a man, or in my case, as a woman.

I know that every day, millions of women live similar (or even worse) situations that mine, in their homes, jobs or even on the street with strangers. But it is precisely talking about it and knowing that this is a global affair, that leads us to become aware and take action as a society and not as separate genres, because in the end, regardless of our differences, we are all vital in some way. Additionally, with the empowerment of women and the balance of gender’s equality gap, nations would make a great progress on achieving some of the SDGs, since there would be better and many more opportunities to all genders in the fulfilling of their whole potential in the society.

I wanted to conclude this entry by citing this quote: Gender equality is essential to ensure that every child – girl and boy – has a fair chance in life. (UNICEF, 2018).

I think it gives us encouragement to continue building a better future for all of us!

What are your thoughts?

References:

UN. (2021). Goal 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls. Retrieved from: https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/gender-equality/

UNICEF. (2018). Gender equality overview. Retrieved from: https://data.unicef.org/topic/gender/overview/

UNICEF. (2021). Gender equality. Retrieved from: https://www.unicef.org/gender-equality

Sheth, S., Hoff, M., Ward, M., Tyson, T. (2021). These 8 charts show the glaring gap between men's and women's salaries in the US. Retrieved from: https://www.businessinsider.com/gender-wage-pay-gap-charts-2017-3

Thanks!

Sharon.