Dear Ijeawele, Or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions

“I matter. I matter equally. Not ‘if only'. Not ‘as long as'. I matter equally. Full stop.”

This book is a very small book (65 pages) with very important messages. I wanted to highligh everything.
Please read it!

The text that follows is a personal sharing and not a comment on the book. Is is about my journey and why I am commited to educating myself about privile and feminism. Consider yourself warned, be gentle and proceed with caution.

I grew up with 5 brothers and all my life I did the same things they did: I loved stories, I played with legos, I had dolls but also cars and Dinosaurs (barbies use to ride a T-Rex), I had a bike and rollerblades and loved them. I did not like football, but not all of them did anyway, and it was mostly because of my clumsiness. I run in parks, climbed trees and got dirty. I did this almost always wearing a dress or leggins because of the freedom of movement. I was always able to choose my own clothes, except when we had lunch with my grandparents.

I grew loving books, music and board games. I love Star Wars and Lord of the Rings as well as Beauty and the Beast, Little Mermaid and Alladin (We all still know these movies by heart).

I was always absolutely convinced I would study STEM subjects. My father advised me to choose any engineering course (because I loved math and physics) but I chose biochemistry. I hated it so much that I wanted to get as far away from the subject as possible and went on to study management, specializing in finance.

I did not know how privileged I was when I was growing up. In fact, I am still learning about privilege in general.

I knew I was privileged in many areas of my life: I grew up with a family, I was able to study and have nothing significant lacking in my life. I am aware that this is a huge amount of privilege obviously, what I didn't understand was how lucky I was to grow in a family that teach me I could be whatever I wanted.

When I started going to interviews I was asked if I had a boyfriend, when was I planning to have kids and if I felt comfortable travelling since it would affect the family.

When I started working in corporate finance we were 8 women in approximately 40 employees and only one was a Director.

When I started going to client board meetings I was almost always the only woman in the room.

In 10 years of consultancy I only spoke with 3 women with decision making power and only one of them was CEO.

When we decided to have kids I really wanted a girl because of the extra challenge of preparing her for a world that it is still not equal for women. I wanted to raise a girl to be whatever she wants but aware of her privilege, as well as the dificulties she might face.
Little did I know about the immensity of a challenge it is.

I know what I want to teach her and is absolutely in line with everything written in this book. The problem is educating society.
Society begins to invent gender roles even before they are born! I keep explaining to my husband's family the kind of toys and clothes I want and go on receiving kitchen appliances and pink babies.
At this point, I am not even sure if she really likes pink and purple or if it was manipulated by the tons of pink objects available in the world (I try to choose everything in happy colours to counterbalance but it is a challenge).

I keep seeing friends and family raising their kids with gender biases and its tricky to interfere as nobody likes to be told what to do.
Gender injustice is real, but I always have to prove its existence and its exhausting. Even the friends that acknowledge gender injustice have difficulty in understanding that a lot of their actions and language are gender biased.

I feel very lucky with my life and what I have accomplished. I want to see more females in positions of power. I want it not to feel like luck and to be available to all women.

I will keep educating myself and force my friends do the same and eventually we will #BreakTheBias.