My neighbor has a Muslim friend and she’s pregnant. Now keep in mind that I live in Canada, which is widely thought of as a tolerant and open society. However, this woman said that her husband’s family was very disappointed (angry) that she was going to have a girl child instead of a boy. They blamed her, despite the fact that men are actually responsible for what gender the baby is. They prize men over women because of their culture and yes, their religion.

You can see this attitude in a fairly recent Canadian study:

Recent stories about gender preferences for babies in Canada brought into the spotlight surprising attitudes on this controversial topic, as it's been shown to correlate with sex-selective abortions and a lower quality of care for girls.

This is just one example of what women face worldwide. Take for example the brutal gang rape that recently occurred in India:

The hours-long gang-rape and near-fatal beating of a 23-year-old student on a bus in New Delhi triggered outrage and anger across the country Wednesday as Indians demanded action from authorities who have long ignored persistent violence and harassment against women.

After this news report was released, the press began to dig a little and found that women are raped all the time in India and many don’t report it because it will bring shame to their family. Either that or they will be treated as if the rape were their fault and not the fault of the ones who actually perpetrated the crime.

Next stop, we have the useless UN. The UN tried to create a treaty that would protect women around the world. But guess what?

Some countries were extremely reluctant to sign:

Of the 161 countries ratifying the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, about 44 have said they will not implement certain provisions of the treaty on political, constitutional, cultural or religious grounds.

Around the world, women are routinely paid less for doing the same job as a man. Take this article in USA Today as an example:

AAUW took a closer look at the difference between men and women who enter the same occupation. The apples-to-apples comparison found that women still earned about 7% less than their male counterparts. Give their similarities, this pay gap is unexplained, and gender discrimination is one potential factor, the study says.

"A lot of people think that stereotypes are a thing of the past," says Catherine Hill, director of research at AAUW. "But we see that these things are continuing and real."

Not only do some of them earn less, but they are sometimes discriminated against because they may have children or may have children in the future. Employers will sometimes try to get away with asking how many children a potential employee has or whether they intend to have children in the near future. These questions rarely get asked of a man.

Next stop, we have the Middle East.

In Saudi Arabia, women are not allowed to drive, get a higher education, get paid for work or be married without a male guardian’s permission. In places like Iran, Syria and Yemen, women activists are jailed or killed.

Of course, there is also the Burkha, which many women activists in North America have focused on to show male oppression. In some countries, the Burkha is extended to cover the entire body – showing an ankle would be considered a crime or socially unacceptable.

There is also genital mutilation to contend with. In places like Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and Egypt, around half of women have had their genitals cut.

We often think of places like Japan as being highly civilized. However, stats show that between 0-10% of their government is comprised of females. The same can be said for places like China.

This article could be very long. In many places, women are treated like cattle, sex slaves or household slaves. The gang rape in India is just one indicator of this and yet we in the West continue to ignore the plight of women here and abroad.

It’s time we start paying more attention.