Their wedding day. It’s a day that many young girls dream about, they just don’t imagine it happening when they are only 12-years-old. Thea is 12 and she’s walking down the aisle to marry a 37-year-old man named Geir. Hundreds of people are in the aisles attending the ceremony…not to congratulate the couple, but to protest child marriage. As for Thea, when the priest asks her if she wants to marry, she emphatically shakes her head “no”.
The situation in this video is a dramatization, but it’s nevertheless a stunning moment, when you realize that tens of thousands of underage girls are forced into marriage every day in real life. Those girls don’t have the support or resources to refuse the marriage like Thea does.
This powerful PSA was filmed by Plan Norway for UN’s International Day of the Girl Child. It’s meant to highlight the issue of child brides and what happens to many young girls in poor countries around the world. Plan Norway made the video to spread awareness of the issue and to help its programs that promote children’s right to health care, education and protection from violence and abuse in 51 developing countries.
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