5 Women Empowerment Celebrity Advocates That Every Woman Should Be Following
If you don’t know where to start your women empowerment journey, then follow empowered women who unapologetically use their platforms to promote feminism and help other women.
From body positivity to gender equality advocates, we give you five women celebrity advocates you should be following:
A well-acclaimed Filipina actress, Iza Calzado is an advocate of women empowerment. With every opportunity she can get, she passionately talks about issues on self-love, body positivity, and equality. She even co-founded She Talks Asia, a women empowerment platform for modern Filipinas.
When she was asked about the definition of empowered women in her Calyxta interview, Iza Calzado expressed it as confidence and a responsibility:
“I think an empowered woman, first of all, can make decisions for her own life, and is totally responsible for herself. Sometimes, even for others. Right? But more of she can be responsible for herself, she is confident in who she is, especially to the point that she doesn’t need to pull down others in order to feel good about herself. Because there are people who are confident but need to pull down others in order to feel confident. An empowered woman cares—cares about what’s happening around her.”
Apart from being known as Hermoine of the Harry Potter film series, Emma Watson is a known advocate of feminism with her strong views on women empowerment and gender equality. Even in the face of criticism, she continues to speak out about it, encouraging men and women to fight for gender equality. And, for her, empowered women have choices:
“We want to empower women to do exactly what they want, to be true to themselves, to have the opportunities to develop. Women should feel free. There is no typical feminist, there is nothing anywhere that says you have to meet a certain [set of] criteria.”
Ever since she started as a host in the Philippine entertainment industry, Bianca Gonzalez has always raised important issues, especially women empowerment. She is also a part of the empowered women behind She Talks Asia, acting as their Content Director. A believer of gender equality, Bianca Gonzalez tries to raise her daughter in a gender-neutral way:
“Since she was born, I've been very conscious about exposing our daughter to gender-neutral colors, toys and books. White, gray, khaki, navy. Cooking sets and cars. No such thing as for girls only or for boys only.”
The Good Place actress Jameela Jamil is an outspoken feminist. Without limits, she calls out other Hollywood celebrities who take part in perpetuating girls’ body insecurities by accepting unhealthy deals. She refuses to be airbrushed and managed Avon to pull out a campaign that highlights body-shaming. To help and create more empowered women who are proud of their body, she launched her body-positivity organization called I Weigh.
She calls herself a feminist-in-progress, saying:
“I think we are all feminists-in-progress. II believe that we don’t all have all of the answers, and I think that there’s a great power in admitting to that, because then you create space for yourself to grow, and to learn, and to change. I’m someone who didn’t understand feminism; I didn’t even know the term intersectional feminism, I think because I just thought, ‘Well, I love all people, so therefore I am an intersectional feminist.’ But my feminism wasn’t specifically targeting and helping and elevating cultures that weren’t mine. I was focusing on the plight of brown women, and therefore ignoring the plight of black women or women with disabilities or women who are deaf, or blind, or trans.”
An award-winning actress, Angel Locsin is also known for her humanitarian works, from personally delivering donations to helping out unprivileged children to finish their schools. She also works with different organizations to promote women’s rights. Angel Locsin uses her huge following on social media to voice different issues, from her political standpoint to women empowerment, tweeting remarks like:
“As women, we need to stick together to empower us collectively. I vote we stop the girl-on-girl crime!”