IF NOT ME, WHO; EMMA WATSON’S EQUALITY SPEECH

Emma Watson, UN Address

Recently Emma Watson, the British actress and UN Women Goodwill Ambassador, delivered a powerful gender inequality speech at the UN event for the launching of a new campaign called HeForShe. In my personal opinion, I found the speech to be wonderful. It was moving, inviting, and captured all of the elements of feminism that the world needs to experience.

Miss Watson spoke about how the word “feminism” has a stigma attached to it and that people no longer like to identify with the word. People prefer not to identity with the word feminist, as they do not want to be seen as “anti-men” or “man-hating”. The idea that feminists are “anti-men” stems from the previous waves of feminism where hard fighting had been done to achieve the women’s rights that we have today. In her speech Emma Watson says, “I was appointed as Goodwill Ambassador for UN Women six months ago and the more I’ve spoken about feminism, the more I have realised that fighting for women’s rights has become synonymous with man-hating. If there is one thing I know for certain, it is that this has to stop.” The main reason behind this “fear” of the word is because people are not properly educated on what it means to be a feminist. This needs to stop as, in its very definition, feminism is the “the advocacy of women’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes.” Do not call yourself a feminist if you do not want to but keep believing and fighting for the equality of sexes because that is a human right.

Rather than focusing the speech on only the females of the world she formally invites both boys and men to join the battle. “How can we affect change in the world when only half of it is invited or feel welcome to participate in the conversation? Men—I would like to take this opportunity to extend your formal invitation. Gender equality is your issue too.” Both men and women experience gender inequality and both men and women need to work together to do something about it. How are we to make a difference if only half of the globe feels welcome to join the cause? 

The HeForShe movement has begun and is taking the Internet by storm. Feminism is continuing to spread and people are beginning to understand what it is really about. Rather than thinking of a group of man-hating females, people are seeing that feminists are a diverse group of people all fighting for the equality. Thanks to the HeForShe campaign people are able to see their idols and celebrities supporting the movement and joining the cause, which then enables them to educate themselves and find that they believe in this fight too.

After watching this speech my English teacher said to us, “Everyone in this class should consider themselves a feminist and if not you should be worried.” This sparked a debate and got a lot of us, including me, thinking. We all should be feminists, whether we are the inadvertent feminists that Emma Watson speaks about or supporters who are proud to associate themselves with the title. As Miss Watson said, “If not me, who? If not now, when?”

Written by: Ailish Delaney

Photos: 1 & 2