Recently I've been writing about what a
feminist foreign policy would look like and noted that
First Lady Michelle Obama articulated it well during her recent visit to England. Here is President Obama doing the same thing in Nairobi, Kenya.
"Treating women as second-class citizens is a bad tradition. It holds you back. There’s no excuse for sexual assault or domestic violence. There’s no reason that young girls should suffer genital mutilation. There’s no place in civilized society for the early or forced marriage of children. These traditions may date back centuries; they have no place in the 21st century." —President Obama in Kenya: http://go.wh.gov/Ko3xvP
Posted by The White House on Sunday, July 26, 2015
Treating women as second-class citizens is a bad tradition. It holds you back. There’s no excuse for sexual assault or domestic violence. There’s no reason that young girls should suffer genital mutilation. There’s no place in civilized society for the early or forced marriage of children. These traditions may date back centuries; they have no place in the 21st century.
These are issues of right and wrong in any culture. But they're also issues of success and failure. Any nation that fails to educate its girls or employ its women and allow them to maximize their potential is doomed to fall behind in the global economy.
He continues to make me proud that he is the President and that I voted for him twice.
ReplyDeleteHear, hear! Excellent speech and an excellent delivery of the message, especially starting with the analogy of the Confederate flag.
ReplyDeleteTradition (or religion) is no excuse for barbarism. I've always felt that Saudi Arabia's extreme relegation of women to inferior status (for example) should have made it as much of an international pariah as apartheid South Africa was.
Whole speech is here (and I quote you) > http://paulocanning.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/obamas-kenyan-hit-trip.html
ReplyDelete