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This short video clip was taken earlier this year in the southern Indian village where Rhema was born. The first time most watch it they see a group of kids singing to the video camera and “hammin’ it up” for the village guests.

However, if you watch it more closely you will see learned behaviors. The boys almost demand to be front and center while the girls quietly move to the background. But when you look closely into these girls faces you can see their hope to be noticed, to be wanted, to be valued.

Almost every girl that we spoke with shared her biggest fear along with her biggest hope with us.

Her fear. Her parents would quietly take her life just like all of her younger sisters and no one in the village would care if she was gone. Even though her life would probably not be taken she surely would be discriminated against the rest of her life.

Her hope. That she would have been born a boy.

If these cultural bias can be learned by young children, they can be relearned for the betterment of all. When a young abandoned girl is rescued she is given value. When she attends school she is given worth. When women self help groups (micro business) thrive their daughters see a new way.