My word: What does equality mean to you?

"Beware the danger of what I call Feminism Lite. It is the idea of conditional female equality. Please reject this entirely. It is a hollow, appeasing and bankrupt idea." - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. 

If both men and women would look at gender equality through the same lenses Chimamanda used when she wrote the book in which I got the above quote from, we wouldn't still be advocating for gender equality in 2020, which happens to be this year's International Women's Day celebrations theme.

We live in a world where women have to work twice as hard to fight biases against them. While some progress has been made in closing the equality gap, 91 per cent of men and 86 per cent of women hold at least one bias against women in relation to politics, economics, education, violence or reproductive rights.

The first gender social norm index which analysed data from 75 countries that, collectively, are home to more than 80 per cent of the global population found that almost half of people feel men are superior political leaders and more than 40 per cent believe men and women think its acceptable for a man to beat his wife.

From this data, it is clear the journey to achieving gender equality is far from complete. We all have a role to play in fighting these prejudices if we are to create a world where everyone's voice matters no matter their gender. I would wish to live in a world where a woman vies for a political seat as long as she has what it takes to do the job and doesn't have to explain her marital status to convince the voters. I wish to live in a world where men see women as equals in and out of our homes. A world where women are treated as equal not out of sympathy but because they deserve it.

What does gender equality mean to you?

Rose Ng'ang'a, Stand-In-Editor