International Women’s Day 2020: ‘I Am Generation Equality’
Image Source: https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/18277204.international-womens-day-2020-inspirational-women/
Every year we celebrate International Women’s Day on the 8th March. In partnership with this year’s theme of “I am Generation Equality: Realising Women’s Rights”, the UN Women agency has taken the lead in launching their own campaign, #GenerationEquality; advocating a multi-generational approach in tackling the concerns of gender-equality in the current generation.
I am Generation Equality: Cindy Sirinya Bishop, celebrity and activist
This is possibly not the first time you have seen the face of this Thai supermodel, actor, TV host and activist in media. However, instead of her usual features as host in Asia’s Next Top Model, Cindy Sirinya Bishop speaks out on International Women’s Day for gender-equality and against gender-based violence. She addresses what she believes to be the solution to Generation Equality and stresses the importance of ‘gender-equality’ as being not just a gender-determined issue, but an issue of basic human rights to freedom, safety and respect from society.
Image Source: © UN Women/Siraphob Werakijpanich https://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/news-and-events/stories/2020/02/i-am-generation-equality-cindy-sirinya-bishop
What does Generation Equality mean?
Generation Equality raises the question of ‘what defines a generation?’; is it our age and the period we were born into, or is our background and the decades we have lived through? Generation Equality states that it is neither - our involvement in the push for our own rights to justice and equality in our everyday lives is regardless of our generational labels. The push for gender equality should be no different.
True generation equality is achieved by challenging these socially constructed ‘dividers’ whilst pushing for involvement of individuals regardless of gender, age, ethnicity, race, religion and country in furthering the cause of gender equality.
‘Future gaze’: can there be a gender-equal world? If so, what does a gender-equal world look like?
The fight for gender equality has been an ongoing process, and 2020 marks the 25th anniversary of the adoption of the Beijing Platform for Action. Launched in 1995, the Beijing Platform for Action was signed as a joint declaration by 193 countries at the Fourth World Conference on Women. Despite its current recognition as ‘the most progressive roadmap for the empowerment of women and girls’, many of its policies are yet to be fulfilled and we remain far from our destination of gender-equality - but what does ‘gender-equality’ look like?
Image Source: © UN Women/Ruby Taylor https://prod.unwomen.org/en/digital-library/multimedia/2020/2/illustration-equiterra-gender-equality-utopia
The UN Women Organisation invites us to explore the various aspects within a gender-equal country: ‘Welcome to Equiterra, where gender equality is real’. Despite its fictionality, Equiterra highlights the many elements which concern gender-equality. From the celebration of diversity and inclusivity, elimination of sexual harassment and gender-related violence, to the achievement of equal representation and provision of equal opportunities in education and the workplace, Equiterra illustrates what the world could be in the future if gender equality was achieved.
What can we do to help further the cause of gender equality?
Despite the convergence of the global consensus on the importance of gender equality, global sentiment has not been sufficient enough in producing change, and not a single country can claim to have achieved complete gender equality. Gender inequality in its normalisation in law and in culture remains unchanged and similar social patterns remain.
Solving the issue of gender equality is not going to happen overnight. From the perspective of Generation Equality, International Women’s Day marks not only a celebration of current achievements but furthermore an implementation of a new method of change against pre-existing frustrations. As individuals, there are many simple actions we can undertake in our everyday lives in furthering gender equality. In helping promote and raise awareness for the cause, we move one step further closer to reaching destination ‘gender-equality’.
Image Source: © Paula Kindsvater CC BY-SA 4.0 https://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/news-and-events/in-focus/international-women-day
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