“It’s about having the same social, political and economic rights between the two sexes,” 13-year-old Zainab Ale said without hesitation. Ask a Guide about feminism these days, and you should expect an informed answer.
Zainab is one of the first recipients of a new Girlguiding badge for global gender equality, announced on Wednesday, the latest stage in the feminist overhaul of the 105-year-old organization.
The modernization of the Guides has gathered pace since the appointment of a new chief executive in 2012, and while a generation ago badges including homemaker, hostess and needlewoman may have inadvertently limited members’ vision to their own front door, the new badge is intended to expand their geographical and political horizons.
Earning the Girlguiding “Breaking Barriers” badge, aimed at girls aged 10 to 14, teaches Guides about the limitations women and girls face around the world and to look at hard-hitting issues such as forced marriage, poor healthcare and gender equality.
“I think it’s very important that people know that girls aren’t treated the same — boys go to school and girls have to stay home,” said 12-year-old Cali Levine, at the launch of the badge at the houses of parliament in central London.
Tasks for Guides working to gain the badge include sorting out “need” statements (the right to go to school) from the “wants” (having a new phone), Cali said, adding: “It made me sad because I didn’t know how bad it was, and we are all equal really. If you put your mind to it you can do anything you want to do — we should all be the same.”
Asked if they saw the Guides as a feminist organization, there was little hesitation among this group of Guides. “I feel quite passionate about feminism, because it really makes me think I can help as well in different situations,” said 14-year-old Deborah Miller.
REVOLUTIONARY
“It also makes me think about other thing that are going on around the world,” she said.
Hannah Brooks, 12, a member of the 1st Goodmayes troop in Ilford, Essex, said: “I think the Guides is a feminist organization — because even though Guides is for girls, we’re not saying Guides only supports girls, we’re supporting both [sexes] and we think they should both be equal.”
Mary Wollstonecraft would be proud.
Girlguiding’s chief, Guide Gill Slocombe, insisted that despite the stereotype, it had always been a revolutionary organization.
“The Guides have always been at the cutting edge of enabling girls to do whatever they want,” she said. “From the very start girls were encouraged to swim, to cycle — things that weren’t considered fit things for girls to do at that time.”
She laughed off the suggestion that the Guides were in danger of being labeled a radical feminist organization, but added: “You educate a girl and you educate a nation — perhaps it sounds arrogant to say it, but if you teach the educators of the future — perhaps the world might be a better place.”
The badge — developed with input from the Department for International Development and Girl Hub — will be taught in an “age-appropriate manner,” said Slocombe, adding that girls would still be able to do their chocolate badge, and get points for throwing a good party.
GIRLS’ RIGHTS
“Parents have been really supportive,” she said. “They want their daughters to feel they can do whatever they want and have the same opportunities as their sons.”
Since Julie Bentley took over as chief executive of the Guides in 2012. the organization has been transformed from being seen as a rather old-fashioned youth group to part of growing global girls’ and women’s rights movement, typified by campaigns such as the UN’s HeForShe campaign fronted by Emma Watson.
Girlguiding ditched the promise to serve God and country in 2013 and last year introduced a body confidence badge after an attitudes survey carried out by the organization revealed that one in five girls of primary school age had been on a diet, while 38 percent of girls aged 11 to 21 said they had sometimes skipped meals to help lose weight.
Girls have taken part in the No More Page 3 campaign, which lobbied Rupert Murdoch to remove half-naked pictures of women from the UK’s Sun newspaper, and last year sent a historic open letter to MPs calling on them to listen to the voices of girls in the run-up to the general election.
Justine Greening, the international development secretary, is one of those listening. Having presented the Guides with their badges, she was asked about her own belief in girls’ rights.
“I think that countries can only develop if all the population is involved,” she said. “Imagine in the UK if all the women just stopped — we wouldn’t get anywhere, would we?”
Tasks completed, badges collected — the Guides get ready to go home. When asked where she learned about feminism, Zainab said: “It’s in Flawless by Beyonce, it’s my favorite song.” And she has the last word on the Guides’ new badge: “It makes me want to change things about how society sees girls. We can do everything that boys can do — don’t judge us by the outside, but what’s on the inside.”
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