04 Dec Unearthed Footage Shows Meghan Markle Fighting Against Sexism When She Was Just Eleven Years Old

Well, it’s official. 33-year-old Prince Harry and 36-year-old Meghan Markle are engaged, and with that news comes a public need to find out everything there is to know about the future wife of the prince. So far it turns out that she’s pretty awesome!

In fact, the princess-to-be is so awesome that she managed to get a sexist company to change its ways when she was just eleven years old.

We already know that Meghan is a fantastic actress – best known for playing Rachel Zane in the legal drama, Suits. But she’s also an activist, spending much of her time championing women’s rights.

She is a global ambassador for World Vision, an advocate for the UN Women’s Political Participation and Leadership Program, and a counselor for the UK-based charity One Young World.

Meghan has also been very vocal about her political views in interviews – openly supporting Hilary Clinton, criticizing Donald Trump for his misogynistic behavior, and lamenting the Brexit vote.

However, royal protocol may mean Meghan will have to keep her opinions in check. As a future face of the Royal Family, her activist work will have to be carefully screened. She has already stopped using her social media accounts and is expected to leave Suits to focus on charitable and royal obligations full-time.

This change may come as shock to Meghan, who has been working on her activist work from a very young age.

Meghan showed a flair for activist work from a young age. At only eleven years old, she was already advocating for women’s equality and making changes in the world.

In grade school, Meghan was asked to analyze different advertisements for a class project. A television advert for Ivory dishwashing detergent stood out to her because of its sexist language.

The voiceover for the ad stated that “women all over America are fighting greasy pots and pans”. Meghan immediately took issue with the use of the word “women”, suggesting that only women did housework while men did not.

With encouragement from her father, Meghan wrote letters to manufacturer Proctor & Gamble, Hilary Clinton who was First Lady at the time, civil rights lawyer Gloria Allred, and to Nick News anchor Linda Ellerbee.

Nick News responded and actually interviewed Meghan for an on-air segment. Due to her early activism, the company changed the advertisement wording to “people” instead of “women”.

Meghan has also recently spoken out about how this early experience shaped her life as an adult on International Women’s Day.

As a UN Women’s Ambassador, Meghan gave a speech for International Women’s Day in 2015 and referenced her early advocacy experience.

“My eleven-year-old self worked out that if I really wanted someone to hear me, well then I should write a letter to the First Lady,” she said.

“I also put pen to paper, and I wrote a letter to my news source at the time, Linda Ellerbee, who hosted a kids news program, and then to powerhouse attorney Gloria Allred because even at eleven I wanted to cover all my bases.”

“Finally I wrote to the soap manufacturer. And a few weeks went by, and, to my surprise, I received letters of encouragement from Hillary Clinton, from Linda Ellerbee, and from Gloria Allred.”

She continued by explaining how amazing it felt to make a positive change. She had clearly been bitten by the activist bug early in life.

“It was at that moment that I realized the magnitude of my actions. At the age of eleven, I had created my small level of impact by standing up for equality.”

Harry and Meghan have recently been giving multiple official interviews related to their engagement, and they both say they are committed to future charitable and activist work. They will certainly be quite the inspirational couple!

Here’s Meghan’s original interview for Nick News:

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