LET'S TALK ABOUT INEQUALITY......BLOG ACTION DAY 2014

Hey guys, thanks for stopping by today. Like I said in my prevent post, today is blog action day and I am glad to be a part of it. If you want to know more about it, please check here. This year's topic is on INEQUALITY. I hope you all enjoy what I have to say about it. I am going to keep it very personal so I do hope you read everything and are inspired.

While trying to get material for my write up I searched for inequality and I saw that there are different types of inequalities but what I decided to write on was Gender Inequality.

According to wikipedia, 'gender inequality refers to unequal treatment or perceptions of individuals based on their gender. It arises from differences in socially constructed gender roles as well as biologically through chromosomes, brain structure, and hormonal differences'. The article later describes the difference areas of life where gender inequality occurs like in the workplace, different professions, television and film, at home and the levels in different countries. To read more check here

What I found amazing is that no country has gender equality, some have an almost optimal equality but the scale is still tipping towards the male gender. Checking the statistics for Africa I saw that it was around 0.55 (1=equality). That would mean there is almost 55% equality in Africa. I don't know if it is true but I know that females have a better chance of fairness now as against during the times of my grandmother.

I am always grateful to God for my maternal grandmother. I keep saying if she didn't strive to work hard to make money (even though it was not much it was enough to provide for the education of her children) i won't be writing this right now. I am grateful that she said all her girl children must go to school. My grandfather was probably involved in the training of my mum and her siblings but it was minimal (heck the guy had a lot of other children to take care of to really bother that much).

I always say that if my mum and aunty had not attended university and had their degrees I might not be who I am today. Without my mum's degree she wouldn't have been able to do some things that she was able to do for my brother and I when my dad messed up when we were younger. And trust me my dad really messed up when we were young, like big time!

Whenever he messed up, my mum always rose up to the challenge and made us not to miss out on a lot of things. I always wonder that if she had not been educated and exposed to some things when my dad displayed some stunts I would probably have a different mentality by now. My mum while in university used to travel to the U.K to buy stuff and sell so she was exposed to the culture therefore her way of thinking was way different than others. 

For instance when my dad did not feel some things were necessary my mum would argue and stand up for those things to be done. I knew she did most of them because I was mature enough to understand the things then. If my grandmother had said like I have heard some people say that females are just meant to stay in the home and be under a man instead of enforcing that my mum and her sister go to school imagine what would have happened at those times.

My aunty is the head of the works department in an area council in Abuja, she has been a head since 2007 and you cannot imagine how proud I am of her. She is always being sent to one country after another officially that when I told my grandmother that I was traveling to Dubai this year after my trip to SA last year, she said ‘your aunty is teaching you how to travel o’. Which one is Dubai this year, SA last year ehen? ….lol. And maybe she is right even though i was actually I was inspired to travel by my mum who like I said used to travel to the U.K when she was younger. Traveling to new places broadens your horizons and changes your mindset. Once again I say if my grandmother had not pushed all her kids to go to school and made sure that they read their books and passed what would the story be now.

It is amazing how in some states in Nigeria and some countries, even basic primary education is denied to the female child. And anyone who voices out against it is attacked. The Noble prize winner for peace for 2014 Malala was attacked because she dared to open her mouth to speak against not educating the female child. And she is a kid for crying out loud! Yesterday marked 6 months since the 219 Chibok girls in Nigeria were kidnapped and leaders of my country have not been able to do anything yet. Sometimes I wonder if the kids were males, would they have been rescued by now?.

Finding out that even in these times, there is disparity in the salaries of women against men in a particular field is annoying. What do they mean by that? Is my certificate different from a man’s own? Is it not the same class we sat in, the same exams we wrote and the same degree we obtained? Most times the females are on top of the class. In my pharmacy school, the best graduating student in my set and the set before us were girls. In the top 10 of my class, 7 were females so where do people come off.  

I am a strong independent woman because of my grandmother, mum and aunty. I refuse to allow anyone to treat me badly. I rise up to any challenge because I always say I have the blood of three strong women in my life. And I would say again that I am extremely grateful to God for my background. We are not richest in material things but we are extremely wealthy in things that matter.

Even as I am grateful for my life, I am sad because millions of females all over the world are been marginalized because of their gender. When would we as a planet get to gender equality? I have absolutely no idea but I hope and pray that it would happen soon. I say NO to GENDER INEQUALITY. The fact that I am born a female does not give anybody the right to deny me my rights. I also say NO to INEQUALITY of all types.

I wrote on gender inequality because I could personally talk about it. I am positive I would see some blogs that would talk about racial inequality but growing up in Nigeria where blacks are the majority I have never felt like I was inferior. Which reminds me, was there another teen shooting in Ferguson USA again? Like what is going on there? I don’t exactly have the full details on what happened but I saw clips of the protest on the instagram page of essence magazine. What I did notice was majority of the police men were whites. When I saw it I was like ‘kosi olopa to dudu sibe abi kilode’ (there is no black policeman there or what is happening). Strange considering that it is said that a fairly large amount of blacks living in that area…hmmm I just hope they are able to do something about the killings, enough is enough. No race is superior to another, we are all made the same.

I hope you enjoyed reading my post. It was long read I know but I hope it was worth it. Read, be inspired and share…… #BAD2014 #INEQUALITY 

Please go to blogactionday.org to check out blogs that are taking part in the event today and read what inequality means to them. I am hopping on to the site now to get inspired.

Thanks for stopping by…..

Luv ya,

Petite Diva

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