Beyonce: "Gender Equality Is a Myth!"

Through her website The Shriver Report: Reporting From the Front Lines of Our Changing Lives, Maria Shriver has partnered with the Center for American Progress to launch A Woman's Nation Pushes Back from the Brink. The study and full report "will examine the rates of financial insecurity among American women and the children who depend on them, investigate the impact of it on our nation’s institutions and economic future, and promote modern solutions to help women strengthen their financial status." The website and report feature commentaries and essays by various celebrities, including one powerful piece "Gender Equality Is a Myth!" by Beyoncé Knowles-Carter. Read Beyonce's piece below or HERE, and see a brief introduction to A Woman's Nation Pushes Back from the Brink.


Gender Equality Is a Myth!
01.12.2014
By Beyoncé Knowles-Carter

We need to stop buying into the myth about gender equality. It isn’t a reality yet. Today, women make up half of the U.S. workforce, but the average working woman earns only 77 percent of what the average working man makes. But unless women and men both say this is unacceptable, things will not change. Men have to demand that their wives, daughters, mothers, and sisters earn more—commensurate with their qualifications and not their gender. Equality will be achieved when men and women are granted equal pay and equal respect.

Humanity requires both men and women, and we are equally important and need one another. So why are we viewed as less than equal? These old attitudes are drilled into us from the very beginning. We have to teach our boys the rules of equality and respect, so that as they grow up, gender equality becomes a natural way of life. And we have to teach our girls that they can reach as high as humanly possible.

We have a lot of work to do, but we can get there if we work together. Women are more than 50 percent of the population and more than 50 percent of voters. We must demand that we all receive 100 percent of the opportunities.

This is an excerpt from The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Pushes Back from the Brink, in partnership with the Center for American Progress. Download the full report here for FREE from January 12th – January 15th.