Meghan Markle: Stand Up for Equality

Meghan Markle - Your Voice Matters

Suits star Meghan Markle talks about the moment in her life when she realized the power of individual actions to affect change. At age 11, she stood up for gender equality -- and won.

Transcript: 

"Yeah, that's where women belong, in the kitchen. See, I had been in school watching a TV show in elementary school and this commercial came on with the tagline for this dish washing liquid and the tagline said, 'Women all over America are fighting greasy pots and pans.'

"I remember feeling shocked and angry. So I went home and I told my dad what had happened. He encouraged me to write letters, so I did, to the most powerful people I could think of. A few weeks went by and to my surprise, I received letters of encouragement from Hillary Clinton, from Linda Ellerbee, and from Gloria Allred, and it was roughly a month later when the soap manufacturer, Proctor and Gamble, changed the commercial for their Ivory Clear Dish Washing Liquid.

"It was at that moment that I realized the magnitude of my actions. At the age of 11, I had created my small level of impact by standing up for equality. In doing this, we remind girls that their small voices are in fact not small at all and that they can affect change. It means that a wife is equal to her husband, a sister to her brother. Not better, not worse, they are equal."