Educate and Elevate!
"What if the cure to cancer was trapped inside the mind of someone who cannot get an education?" - Unknown.
What if that someone is a young girl amongst the 65 million that are deprived of one?
And we continue to do them (and ourselves) a disservice by denying them the means to fulfil their potential?
I know they're so many reasons why young people's education would be disrupted in less developed countries- like the financial barriers and eventual prioritisation of survival.
But I want to focus on another dimension of the unfairness which is the deliberate exclusion of girls' in schools', which operates from a place of discrimination, rather than a result of compulsion.
In the more 'advanced' societies, the education of girls and the empowerment of women have come together and so many powerful, educated women have thrived like now outnumbering and outperforming men in educational institutions. This is recognisable evidence of the lack of opportunity being a huge hindrance to their successes.
And, even today, some corners of the world are yet to uncover the abilities of their women and what a shame it is to deprive themselves of that contribution.
It's crazy to think sometimes that such huge differences exist between the different time zones, despite living in the same time. Where we deal with the debris of an outdated mindset, they are left to tackle its full form.
Where, in our part of the world, we can lean on our rights whereas, over there, they are victims of the 'norm' which is often a non-voluntary extinction of their independence.
Also, the elimination of education strips them of their autonomous rights to becoming self-sufficient individuals and instead, they are perceived as second-rate, dependants.
Exploited, oppressed and yet a liability.
​Female literacy isn't just something that damages their potential careers or the input they could contribute to within their communities and the economy, but it empowers women to take charge of their lives, especially when it comes to unsafe and unhappy marriages (or other relationships) by shattering the need to tolerate in the name of financial security. It also sets a higher standard for the future generations of girls to know what to expect from their lives and not settling for the sake of upholding tradition.
As of right now, young girls are conditioned to expect the submissive and ghost-like existence of women as the norm, as they bear witness to it time and time again, which slaughters the female ambition before it has a chance to evolve.
I have to admit some hesitation in talking about this since it's not something that I can directly relate to. But I think it’s important to vocalise the differences between our world and theirs, without speaking for or over their experiences. Also, I don't believe in the selective idea of equality, as it seems like a direct contradiction of the meaning of equality. Instead, I think everyone around the globe (including the women!) are entitled to see the world that they occupy for what it is.
But the fact is that we’re in the 21st century - the age of iPhones and virtual realities - and yet the prospect of getting an education is still a fantasy, rather than a reality for so many girls.
How can we reach the edges of empowerment without investing in the brilliance of 65 million minds and when did we allow our borders to detach us from the rest of the world?
Why don’t we consider the possibility that female empowerment begins with an education?
Or that wherever the patriarchy is happy and healthy, the education of girls could be the first wound it suffers.
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Image source: https://www.topsimages.com/images/first-impact-education-13.html
