Coming Soon to a Theater Near You: A Movie That Shows Why You Should Call on the Senate to Ratify CEDAW

I had the pleasure to attend a prescreening of Desert Flower, a film about the life of Waris Dirie, the international supermodel from Somalia. Spoiler alert. This is NOT a film about modeling. This is a film about human rights.

Dirie was subjected to female genital mutilation (FGM) when she was five years old. She ran away from her village at age thirteen, when she found out she was being sold into marriage to a man old enough to be her grandfather. The film tracks her journey from the desert to the United Nations, where she testified about the lifelong physical and mental suffering endured by victims of FGM.

Worldwide, women and girls are denied their human rights, including the right to freely chose marriage, and to be free of gender-based violence. CEDAW, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, stands for the proposition that women's rights are human rights and sets forth fundamental principles of women's equality. The United States is one of only seven countries — including Iran, Sudan, Somalia, and three small Pacific island countries — that have not ratified CEDAW.

Please do your part to ensure fundamental human rights for women and girls. Call on the Senate to ratify CEDAW and strengthen the United States as a leader standing up for women and girls. To paraphrase Dirie, "Let’s try to change what it means to be a woman."