My mother once told me that she refused to get a sonogram when she was pregnant with me. This was back in China in the mid-1980s, only a few years after the one-child policy had been implemented. She said that if friends and family knew I was a girl, they might try to convince her to get an abortion, and she didn’t want that pressure. It’s a thought process that, at the time, was both progressive and elemental.
That story, and the choice by my mom nearly 30 years ago, is something that resonates with me today as we recognize International Women’s Day.
Are things really that different now?
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the No Ceilings Initiative from the Clinton Foundation released a joint report that analyzes the gains made by women and girls (as well as the gaps that remain) over the past twenty years.
Conclusion: We’re not close on gender equality – in developed and developing countries. The foundation released a pretty clever video, reminding us all that we’re #NotThere.
But tomorrow is another day, and I am excited to wake up and take another crack at that glass ceiling.