Here's why President Obama thinks this is 'an extraordinary time to be a woman'

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published 4 August 2016

From the perspective of a father, a feminist, and president of the United States, Barack Obama thinks this is this is a truly "extraordinary time to be a woman." In an essay penned for Glamour, Obama, a self-declared feminist, marveled at how far women's rights have come in just the 55 years he's been alive:

In my lifetime we've gone from a job market that basically confined women to a handful of often poorly paid positions to a moment when women not only make up roughly half the workforce but are leading in every sector, from sports to space, from Hollywood to the Supreme Court. I've witnessed how women have won the freedom to make your own choices about how you'll live your lives — about your bodies, your educations, your careers, your finances. Gone are the days when you needed a husband to get a credit card. In fact, more women than ever, married or single, are financially independent. [Glamour]

But, Obama admitted, as his girls prepare to "leave the nest" and enter the world as adult women, he's also acutely aware of how much progress still needs to be made. "We need to keep changing the attitude that raises our girls to be demure and our boys to be assertive, that criticizes our daughters for speaking out and our sons for shedding a tear," Obama wrote. "We need to keep changing the attitude that punishes women for their sexuality and rewards men for theirs."