Hillary Gets It. Women, New Media, and International Diplomacy

Baby-kissing season is long over and graduation season's arrived.  And with this season of celebration comes a boatload (or podium-load as the case may be) of inspirational speeches.  Hillary Clinton made a remarkable speech at Barnard College on Monday that we wanted to make sure to share with you. 

In this speech, she touched on the role of women, new media and privilege in international diplomacy; and stressed the importance of using social media not only to update your friends on your daily goings-on but to unite your friends to do good and fight real challenges the world is facing. 

Why?  In short, she employs the old adage that access is a privilege, and with that privilege comes responsibility.  After loads of applause, she ties up the speech by saying, "I have concluded after traveling many miles and visiting many places in the last decades that talent is universally distributed, but opportunity is not. The futures of these women and girls will affect yours and mine. And therefore, it is not only the right thing to do, but also the smart thing."  Well done, Hillary.

I could say more about her speech, but really Hillary says it best.  There are couple excerpts below and the full text is here.  It's a real treat, check it out!

Oh, and Happy Graduation Season!

Kyra, NOI Fellow

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"And with these social networking tools that you use every day to tell people you’ve gone to get a latte or you’re going to be running late, you can unite your friends through Facebook to fight human trafficking or child marriage, like the two recent college graduates in Colombia – the country – who organized 14 million people into the largest anti-terrorism demonstration in history, doing as much damage to the FARC terrorist network in a few weeks than had been done in years of military action. (Applause.) "

"And you can organize through Twitter, like the undergraduates at Northwestern who launched a global fast to bring attention to Iran’s imprisonment of an American journalist. And we have two young women journalists right now in prison in North Korea, and you can get busy on the internet and let the North Koreans know that we find that absolutely unacceptable. (Applause.)"

"These new tools are available for everyone. They are democratizing diplomacy. So over the next year, we will be creating Virtual Student Foreign Service Internships to partner American students with our embassies abroad to conduct digital diplomacy. And you can learn more about this initiative on the State Department website."

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"As women with strong voices and strong values, you are in a unique position to support women worldwide who don’t have the resources you do, but whose lives and dreams are just as worthy as yours and mine. I have concluded after traveling many miles and visiting many places in the last decades that talent is universally distributed, but opportunity is not. The futures of these women and girls will affect yours and mine. And therefore, it is not only the right thing to do, but also the smart thing."