After taking a short hiatus from our screens, Emma Watson came back into our lives with the highly-anticipated Little Women trailer this week. But perhaps more importantly, she’s also just broadcast a fascinating conversation that she had with human rights activist and Nobel Peace laureate Dr Denis Mukwege (which was facilitated by the How To Academy and New York Times).

Sharing photos from the talk on Instagram after sharing the whole thing on Instagram TV, she captioned it: “Who needs two minutes of hope today? Probably all of us, haha. I’ve put the entirety of my conversation with @drdenismukwege on my IGTV and will be posting my favourite bits here for you all. #Spoiler, Dr. Denis Mukwege is my hero.”

And boy was she right. 

In a short clip of the event, Watson shared some powerful words about why we cannot accept the violence that so many women continue to face today. 

“I see that this room is mostly full of young women, which will mean that almost a third of the people in this room will experience some form of violence, sexual or otherwise, in their lifetime,” she said.

She continued: “I think there’s a sort of strange acceptance as women that not feeling safe, not being completely safe in our societies and our communities is just a fact of life and it’s something we have to accept. That’s just the way of the world. It’s dangerous to be a woman. But I don’t think that we do have to accept that.

“And I do think that there are other ways that we could live and be. And beyond that, I think we deserve it, we have to demand it, we have to believe that it’s possible. We have to believe in that world, it can’t be a utopia.”

High profile followers have already applauded Watson’s words, including Little Women co-star Laura Dern, actor Natalie Portman and writer Reni Eddo-Lodge. 

The talk took place after the recent news that Watson is working to ensure women across the UK know their rights when it comes to experiences of sexual harassment in the workplace. Thanks to a new advice line funded by donations from members of the public and Watson herself, women across the UK will be able to access free legal advice when it comes to fighting and reporting workplace sexual harassment.

As a UN Women Goodwill ambassador who helped launch the UN Women campaign HeForShe, which calls for gender equality, we’re staying tuned for what Watson does next. 

Images: Getty