Welcome to Gaia! :: View User's Journal | Gaia Journals

I probably won't be writing here anymore. It turns out that you just can't control your life. No matter how hard you try, if you're born sick, or however else you were born, that's all you get. Women have no rights, and the world isn't going to change for who knows how long. Black people had to fight for their rights... at the cost of so many lives and so much suffering. Martin Luther King fought for these rights, and died for them.
I don't know why it has to be this way, but it is.

I gave it everything I had. I spent every penny I had saved, the money I was given for a car, and asked much of my parents, to get well. I did this so I could help Alia if she needed support. I had to be well enough to do so. My money has run out, I'm no longer able to go to the doctor like I used to. I can manage once every few months at best.


I hope I live long enough to see the day when men who abuse women are hated as much as racists are. Only 60 years ago black people were thought of as less than everyone else, hardly even human, "animals" they called them. Many men still see women this way, as objects you can barter for. They get paid to marry of their daughters as soon as they are of age. And these women don't get a choice in what happens, only the men do.

To this day women have no rights to choose how they live or who they even have sex with. Can you imagine your father deciding who you will sleep with for the rest of your life? And not being able to say "no"? It happens, in Canada, the US, everywhere. Forced marriage is against the law, but it's still going on. It happened to the person who meant everything to me, I owed her my life, and now it's happening to my dear friend Diana who was like the little sister I always wished I had...

One day the world will change and they'll be hated as much as a racist is nowadays. A woman is worth no less than a man, and should have the same rights. Especially about her own body.

The law is on their side, but it is not enforced. Still, I ask that you pass this on so that everyone can see it for themselves:

http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html

I don't know how a lawyer can, in good conscience, get an 18 year old girl to sign the marriage papers with a 50 year old man. "Yes, I, as a professional, believe these two to be fully and freely consenting to marriage according to the law."


There are many who tell me to stop caring about other people so much, and to look out for myself only.
For those of you who trust the Bible, I always think of Matthew 16:26 in this way:

Shouldn't my friends' life and happiness be as important as my own? Aren't we all equals in God's eyes, regardless of race or gender?

How can I care about my own gain, when the people I care about most lose out on the very same things? I get to choose who I marry, who the mother of my children will be. My doctor confirmed that my condition is not genetic, it will not be passed down to my kids. If I'm careful I can have them someday.

How can I think about myself, how much *I* can gain if I've lost what really matters to me? All I cared about while I was growing up, being sick, stuck at home my entire life... all I needed, the only thing I asked for was to see my friends and their families. I was sure I couldn't have children because of my condition, so I was going to live out my dreams through their children. It no longer mattered if I could have my own family or not, all I needed was to see them be free of the burdens of what you were born with, to not be marked from birth as a sick, or an otherwise "lesser" person. I wanted them to have the life I never had. Seeing others happy was the only joy life ever gave me.

Now I have a choice, I have options, I can do what I want, but what use is it for me to gain the whole world without the people I care about most having the same things?