22 > Next Generation Myanmar In interviews, several youth shared their experiences with discrimination. Many noted that language was often an element in these experiences. ‘Yes, we are discriminated against compared to the people from other country. Rakhine people are being discriminated... As I could not speak Rakhine language and speak only [Myanmar] language despite being Rakhine, I was discriminated in the school too. I did not use to understand anything taught in the school because of the language barrier.’ Ethnic Rakhine, male, Rakhine State, age 27 ‘In Chin State, we also discriminate a lot among ourselves. It is not only the Tatmadaw. There are 50 tribes in Chin State. Since they all have different languages, they use [Myanmar] as the lingua franca. We are often despised if we speak [Myanmar]… ‘…Some make jokes at my ethnicity. Some despised my ethnicity. In school, some do not want me to sit beside them. Especially Rakhine and Bamar people discriminated against us. I once shared a room with a Bamar boy. He gossiped a lot about me and discriminated against me.’ Ethnic Rakhine and Chin, male, Chin State, age 27 ‘There are some cases where Muslims are being discriminated against and still lacking opportunities in education. Since 2015, some [Kaman] Muslims have been issued National Registration Cards, the situation gets a bit better. In the first semester I went to the college, I didn’t have the card. Because I didn’t have the card, the headmaster said I need the card to be enrolled in the college. I cried because I felt so frustrated. For National Registration Cards, we can’t get them easily even when we pay a lot of money for the service. I faced discrimination in school especially from Rakhine.’ Ethnic Kaman, female, Rakhine State, age 20 A greater proportion of youth, however, reported to have been discriminated against based on their level of education (29 per cent) or their job (26.5 per cent). This of course suggests that youth are not concerned about employment prospects purely for financial reasons, but also for reasons of social standing. One 26-year-old shared the experience of her younger brother, whose friends have not had employment deemed worthy by his family: ‘He did not pass the matriculation exam and is working some temporary jobs outside. He has a lot of friends and always go out with them… but my mother always scolds for he always goes out with friends without [a] job.’ About as many youth (28.6 per cent) reported to have experienced discrimination based on their gender. Among female survey respondents, nearly a third (31.3 per cent) said they had experienced gender-based discrimination, at least some of the time. Youth with higher levels of education reported to have experienced discrimination more often than their less-educated peers, suggesting the problem is worse for women beginning professional careers. One 27-year-old woman in Shan State shared: ‘There is gender discrimination in the workplace… For instance, I was assigned as an engineer in the company. However, the construction workers whom I managed such as masons and carpenters do not pay any respect to me because I was a female. Moreover, the higher personnel also tested the capabilities by asking more than the assigned jobs. As it was the construction site, there are some hardships by the time of concrete mixing at night as it was not convenient time to go home for the girls. ‘Of course there are many female engineers. There is a half–half ratio of who are adaptable to the workplace situation and who are not. There are many who are not willing but forcing themselves to work in that engineering career just because to earn money. There are many friends of mine who do not live as engineers and work their own business despite of graduating with engineering majors.’ Other youth interviewed in this study agreed that women were held to a different standard than men in professional contexts, adding that they are also expected to tend to family affairs more than men. When asked about the future, one young woman argued ‘it is going to be better for the boys. For the girls, it will not be that easy… they cannot afford to attend further trainings. The girls also need to support the family so that [makes them] unable to keep going to higher places.’ Taken together, almost three-quarters (72 per cent) of all survey respondents reported to have experienced discrimination in their lives. More than half (59.9 per cent) said they ‘sometimes’ experienced discrimination. About a third of all respondents (36.3 per cent) said they were discriminated against ‘often’ or ‘very often’.