Column: Child marriages are still an issue today
Child marriage is a formal or informal marriage between the two parties where one or both are under 18 years of age, according to Girls Not Brides.
Child marriage violates the rights of children. It affects both boys and girls, but is known to be more common among girls.
Girls Not Brides is a partnership with more than 1,300 civil society organizations across the world committed to end child marriage.
Child marriage is common in countries including Africa, South Asia and Latin America. The countries with the highest rate of child marriages are Niger, Chad, Mali and the Central African Republic.
700 million women today were married before the age of 18 and up to 280 million girls are at risk of being the victim of childhood marriage.
Girls Not Bride made it their mission to ending child marriage, calling it “a harmful traditional practice the affects million of children.”
Families often believe that marrying the daughter off at a young age can be viewed as handing the burden to the husband’s family. Marriage can also be viewed as a tradition in many places, because they believe as soon as the girls start to menstruate, they become a woman.
Other reasons leading to child marriage are to ensure the child safety from harassment or sexual assault. The impact of child marriage is that often child brides are not physically or emotionally ready to become mothers or wives. These children are experiencing domestic violence, complications in pregnancy and childbirth.
More often a younger girl is married to an older man, girls are often viewed as property so they are sometimes married to help with family debts, settle conflicts or substitute for actual money.
March is known as Women’s History Month in honor of women who fought for their rights in the society, but as of today women around the world are still used as poverty or viewed as a burden to the family.
Malala Yousafzai once said “There was a time when women activists asked men to stand up for their rights. But this time we will do it ourselves.”
Women around the United States should all stand up and fight for women's rights, not just for our country but for women all over the world.
