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

Nada Al-Ahdal, the 11-year-old girl in the below video, has shared her thoughts on the forced marriage of young girls to older, more powerful men. Her words are full of courage and wise beyond her years. The malevolent cultural forces that she and large numbers of other young girls struggle against are given a face by stories such as these. She speaks to the systematic oppression, misogyny, poverty and lack of reason in her culture, and serves as a reminder today to be bold, brave and critical in the face of institutionalized hate.

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Ed: B. Bemel