The rise of feminism has resulted in the resolution of most women’s rights related issues in the developed world. This may be the reason why people living in advanced countries find it difficult to comprehend the level of abuse and discrimination that women living in the third world face on a daily basis. Discrimination against women is not a new problem in the developing world but has been prevalent for what seems like ages!

Being a woman living in a third world country often means you suffer discriminatory acts since the time you are born. The culture in most third world countries prefers mail children over females. A son is expected to earn for you when he grows up and take care of you when you grow old. A daughter on the hand is considered a useless expense as you have to spend on bringing her up just to give her away to someone else in marriage. This preference for sons is what urges people to take up female feticide or infanticide even in so called ‘modern’ times.

As girls are not expected to do anything else in life but run the household, in most cases they are denied even primary and secondary education. The number of sexual abuse cases amongst adolescent girls in third world countries are extremely high. Childhood marriages are rampant and any question of pre-marital sex often leads to ‘honor killings’ or cutting off of genital parts. Young women are often traded as sex workers and have little or no knowledge of sexual health, HIV and AIDS.

Early marriages result in premature pregnancy and motherhood, much earlier than what is safe for a woman’s well being. Each year, one woman dies every minute due to complications during pregnancy or childbirth. That’s over half a million women, 99% of whom live in third world countries. Despite several women’s rights movements, the state of women at large in developing countries remains dire.