Applying her personal experience as a professional public speaker, Jonah Chipeco escalated the common discrimination of society toward women when it comes to their physical appearance, specifically how they dress.
Noting that public speaking is a profession that is closely dominated by men, Jonah did not hesitate to pursue such a field, as she knew this was her dream job to offer her second life after her major accident.
“Regardless of who would be my competitor in the field, I went for it; I left my job and tried my luck as a professional speaker,” she said.
During her career, she had experiences with different kinds of audiences, even in a room full of men, where she felt judged because of her gender and her physical appearance during her talk.
“I felt somehow that they were uncomfortable because I’m the only woman in the room, and I just want to start to make them feel that they should focus on the message, not the messenger,” she shared.
This was not the first time that Jonah experienced such judgment on the way she dressed just because she was a woman, as she also encountered someone who boldly told her to change her style just because it did not seem to fit in the industry that she was in.
At first, she felt alerted to this matter, but as time passed, she boldly defended that she could wear anything that she wanted as long as it did not affect her or anybody else. “If you are on stage or in front, it’s okay to stand out and wear something that people can identify with,” she said.
Jonah admitted that this scenario made her uncomfortable at first because she tended to compare herself to men, public speakers who don’t receive such judgments from other people with the way they dress, even though her outfits were decent.
Empowering women with the same experience as hers, she emphasized the need to become more clear about their goals in life rather than these discriminations and also learn to stand out if they knew that they were on the right track, as nobody should dictate to someone how to look just because she is a girl.
