“Better Off Dead” Than Married At 11. Girl Protests Child Marriage on YouTube (W

The video has made the rounds on Reddit, where it was submitted yesterday, and has been rapidly picked up by MSN, Huffington Post. According to NOW News, Nada currently lives with her uncle, to whom she fled when her parents tried to force her into marriage.

Nada’s imploring speech about her terror at being married off and the injustice of depriving her of an education and the innocence of childhood is compelling and elegantly delivered. Her eyes are fixated at the lens, and her speech is hurried, but clear.

“I would have no life, no education. Don’t they have any compassion?” she asks.

The barrage of statistics we encounter on a daily basis can be desensitizing, but when a little girl looks determinedly into the camera and clearly states: “I’d rather die,” the impact is undeniable. The video is thus becoming an effective vehicle for explaining the horrors of underage forced marriage from an uncomfortably personal perspective.

Nonetheless, some statistics can help put her story in context: According to the United Nations, one out of nine girls in developing countries will be married by age 15, and an estimated 14.2 million girls a year will probably become child brides in the next decade.

In Yemen, about half of all women are married as children, Human Rights Watch reports. Furthermore, there is no legal minimum age for marriage in Yemen, which leaves many girls, such as Nada, vulnerable to marital rape, abuse, poverty, and myriad health issues.

In an interview with National Geographic, Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Stephanie Sinclair explains that child marriage “isn’t just harmful to the girls involved. It’s at the root of so many other societal ills: poverty, disease, maternal mortality, infant mortality, violence against women.”

The Internet has helped give this girl a voice that is now being heard all around the globe. But it is important to remember that there are many other children just like her who cannot escape their fate, and whose faces do not appear in videos, and whose names we’ll never know. -

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YmdiK3WzuI" target="_blank" class="aeva_link bbc_link new_win" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YmdiK3WzuI</a>

Posted: at 23-07-2013 05:46 PM (11 years ago) | Gistmaniac

Sick people pedophiles child molesters..

Posted: at 23-07-2013 05:50 PM (11 years ago) | Gistmaniac

Brave little girl.

Now you know why Boko Haram is against western education - they are scared the girls will be made aware of their human rights.

Young girls like Malala (who was shot by the Taliban) and now Nada should be an inspiration to all young and underaged girls being victimised by outdated cultural and religious norms.

Posted: at 23-07-2013 06:43 PM (11 years ago) | Gistmaniac

Muslim people, Muslim countries................ trust me Islam is not the way

Posted: at 23-07-2013 06:52 PM (11 years ago) | Upcoming

 

Posted: at 23-07-2013 06:56 PM (11 years ago) | Gistmaniac

Their oga at the top wired a 9 yr. old called aisha. So they all following in his foot step.

Posted: at 23-07-2013 07:03 PM (11 years ago) | Upcoming

kkkk

Posted: at 23-07-2013 07:42 PM (11 years ago) | Hero

Your dreams will never die my daughter. Evil men with evil plans. They've left matured ladies they frustrated to remain ugly and now tying little girls in their evil cages. They will all pay the prize one after the other. They need fresh innocent and virgin blood to bury their mothers.

Posted: at 23-07-2013 07:54 PM (11 years ago) | Upcoming

I hate islam, they are evil

Posted: at 23-07-2013 08:28 PM (11 years ago) | Gistmaniac

This video would definitely make a baboon like sani yerima horny.i call him a baboon because i think he looks like one.my apology to baboons

Posted: at 23-07-2013 08:46 PM (11 years ago) | Upcoming