Meghan Markle UN Women

ladies and Gentlemen please welcome American TV and film actress and un women's advocate for political participation and Leadership Megan Markle well good evening that doesn't feel like enough does it it's just great evening maybe that's better un Secretary General exec Ive director pum thank you distinguished ladies and gentlemen I am tremendously honored to be un women's advocate for political participation and Leadership I am proud to be a woman and a feminist and this evening I am extremely proud to stand before you on this significant day which serves as a reminder to all of us of

how far we've come but also a mid celebration a reminder of the road ahead I want to tell you a story that'll sort of give context to my being here and my work with you and women when I was just 11 years old I unknowingly and somehow accidentally became a female Advocate I was around the same time as the Beijing conference so a little over 20 years ago where in my hometown of Los Angeles a pivotal moment reshaped my notion of what is possible see I had been in school watching a TV show in elementary

school and um this commercial came on with the tagline for this dishwashing liquid And the tagline said women all over America are fighting greasy pots and pans two boys from my class said yeah that's where women belong in the kitchen I remember feeling shocked and angry and also just feeling so hurt it just wasn't right and something needed to be done so I went home and I told my dad what had happened and he encouraged me to write letters so I did to the most powerful people I could think of now my 11-year-old self worked

out that if I really wanted someone to hear me well then I should write a letter to the first lady so off I went script dribbling away to our first lady at the time Hillary Clinton I um also put pen to paper and I wrote a letter to my news source at the time Linda ellerby who hosted a kids news program and then to Powerhouse attorney Gloria aled because even at 11: I wanted to cover all my bases finally I wrote to the soap manufactur leer and a few weeks went by and to my surprise

I received letters of encouragement from Hillary Clinton from Linda ellerby and from Gloria aled it was amazing the kids news show they sent a camera crew to my home to cover the story and it was roughly a month later when the soap manufacturer Proctor and Gamble changed the commercial for their Ivory clear dishwashing liquid they changed it from women all over America are fighting greasy pots and pans to people all over America it was at that moment that I realized the magnitude of my actions at the age of 11 I had created my small level

of impact by standing up for equality now equality means that President Paul kagame of Rwanda whose country I recently visited as part of my learning Mission with un women it means that he is equal to the little girl the gim a refugee camp who is dreaming about being president one day equality means that un Secretary General ban kimoon is equal to the young intern at the UN who is dreaming about shaking his hand it means that a wife it means that a wife is equal to her husband a sister to her brother not better not

worse they are equal you and women as you guys know has defined the year 2030 as the expiration date for gender inequality and here's what's staggering the studies show that at the current rate the elimination of gender inequality won't be possible until 2095 that's another 80 years from now and when it comes to women's political participation and Leadership the percentage of female parliamentarians globally has only increased by 11% since 1995 11% in 20 years come on this has to change [Applause] women women make up more than half of the world's population and potential so it

is neither just nor practical for their voices for our voices to go unheard at the highest levels of decision making the way that we change that in my opinion is to mobilize girls and women to see their value as leaders and to support them in these efforts to have leaders such as president kagame of Rwanda continue to be a role model of a country which has a parliamentary system comprised of 64% female leaders I mean it's the highest of any government in the world and it's unbelievable we need more men like that just as we

need more men like my father who championed my 11-year-old self to stand up for what is right in doing this we remind girls that their small voices are in fact not small at all and that they can affect change in doing this we remind women that their involvement matters that they need to become active in their communities in their local governments as well as in the highest parliamentary positions it is just imperative women need a seat at the table they need an invitation to be seated there and in some cases where this isn't available well

then you know what then they need to create their own table we [Music] need we need a global understanding that we cannot Implement change effectively without women's political participation it is said that girls with dreams Dre become women with vision may we Empower each other to carry out such Vision because it isn't enough to Simply talk about equality one must believe in it and it isn't enough to Simply believe in it one must work at it let us work at it together starting now thank you so much