Michelle Obama gives a great speech about women leaders

http://feministnews.us/2016/03/09/michelle-obama-just-gave-her-most-powerful-speech-since-shes-been-in-the-white-house/

On International Women’s Day, First Lady Michelle Obama joined in the celebration of the first anniversary of the Let Girls Learn initiative that was launched last year. “62 million girls worldwide,” Mrs. Obama said. “Girls who are just as smart and hard-working as we are — aren’t getting the opportunities that we sometimes take for granted.” Sixty-two million girls is the number of young women who are not in school for a variety of reasons. Some of it is due to money, some due to safety from cultural restrictions, in some places the girls are needed to help more at home, and the worst of the worst, in war-torn areas where people are just happy to be alive.

The First Lady said that the moment she was empowered to act on education for girls was when she began hearing “the drumbeat of horrifying stories.” Stories like Malala Yousafzai, the 200 Nigerian girls that were kidnapped and “grown men trying to snuff out the aspirations of young girls” were what inspired her to speak out. Today still, she cautions that little girls are being “brutally assaulted on their way to school, being forced to marry and bear children when they’re barely even teenagers.” Sadly too many girls all over the world face danger simply because they decided that they are “full and equal human beings … worthy of developing their boundless potential.”

Mrs. Obama outlined barriers that extend far beyond financial means for education. At times it’s about transportation or even not having school bathrooms. “It’s also about attitudes and beliefs,” she said. “The belief that girls simply aren’t worthy of an education; that women should have no role outside the home; that their bodies aren’t their own, their minds don’t really matter, and their voices simply shouldn’t be heard.”

Like many of us who fight for equality, for women’s safety and for women’s rights, Mrs. Obama said that she takes the issue very personally. “While I’m thankful that I’ve never faced anything like the horrors that many of these girls endure, like most women, I know how it feels to be overlooked, to be underestimated, to have someone only half listen to your ideas at a meeting — to see them turn to the man next to you, the man you supervise and assume he’s in charge —or to experience those whistles and taunts as you walk down the street,” Mrs. Obama revealed.