Melinda Gates has traveled the world focusing on the problems and solutions of poverty. By talking to people in the poorest areas, contacting organizations already working on these problems, and supporting even more ways to help, she has become an expert on lifting people up and improving their situations.
Her biggest discovery is how empowering women changes the world. She states, "When you lift up women, you lift up humanity." "Sometimes all that's needed to lift women up is to stop pulling them down." Equal rights are "still often denied by cultural bias against women."
She continues, "Being a feminist means believing that every woman should be able to use her voice and pursue her potential, and that women and men should all work together to take down the barriers and end the biases that still hold women back."
By receiving vaccines, contraception, maternal and newborn care, and education, women, their children and their society can be lifted out of poverty. "When the women were able to time and space their pregnancies, they were more likely to advance their education, earn an income, raise healthy children, and have the time and money to give each child the food, care, and education needed to thrive. When children reach their potential, they don't end up poor. This is how families and countries get out of poverty."
All the countries around the world including the U.S. need to assure women have equal rights. Melinda Gates states, "It's the mark of a backward society - or a society moving backward - when decisions are made for women by men.That's what's happening right now in the U.S." "If a girl can lift up her view of herself, she can start to change the culture that keeps her down."
Look around your own country, state, and community, then realize the various ways the culture, some religions, and government need to change. We all can have equal rights and be lifted up to a better life.
