Gender inequality is an idea or a situation in which men and women are not equal. Gender inequality acknowledges the different treatment or perceptions of individuals partly due to their gender. And, of course, gender inequality mostly affects women and girls. In April of 2018, there was a test launched by the Office for National Statistics to see how much more male workers were being paid than their female counterparts. After companies revealed their workers’ pay, it was found that about 80% of companies paid their male workers more.
In many countries around the world, quality of life is very bad for women. In Saudi Arabia, women were only allowed to vote for the first time in 2015 and ONLY in June of 2018 were women allowed permission by the state to drive. In Yemen, their parliament has never had a female head of state; the law does not mandate equal pay, and women only have partial access to financial services. In Chad, women are much less likely to be educated or be able to vote. There are also serious problems with violence against women in there too.
And it’s the same story elsewhere too. In Iran, women just have partial access to finance and there are problems that go along with them having limited access to it, social problems that often leave them trapped in the power of those who do look after the household finances. In Lebanon, there are nearly no women working in Parliament, and there have been problems in the past with violence directed at women, especially in cases where women have chosen to march for their rights. Unfortunately, their government is complicit in hushing up such events.
But there have also been huge steps taken toward making women’s lives better right across the globe. A state in the USA have opened women-only buses with female drivers to try and tackle the problem of women being harassed on public transport. New York city too has seen the launch of ‘she-rides’ women driven uber-style taxi services.
Also, in Brazil, the Bank Group designed and supported a program to update Rio de Janeiro’s sprawling urban transport system, taking high rates of gender-based violence into account and drafting the urban network to deliver a wide range of services to women.
Some people that I know have been affected by gender stereotyping and inequality. “I have been sexually harassed multiple times and have been harassed just because I was wearing a crop top and jeans. And after rebuking one man, he started throwing snide comments at me: “Women deserve to be told what to do...you’re probably not good enough anyway.” Meanwhile, another friend described how she was treated in the work place: “While the guys all pour the pints, it’s me that ends up doing all the cleaning jobs. It’s just what they all seem to expect of me.” As you can see inequality expands past pay and limits to what they can and cannot do, both in society and in the workplace. They are told what to do and how they should do it too.
This is completely unacceptable, rude and should prompt governments all around the world to start stepping up their game to tackle cat-calling for indecent acts, pay gaps and, overall, the sometimes diminished quality of life that women are often force to accept. Together we must work to end such prejudice.
Comments