Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg speaks at the American Enterprise Institute. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer of Facebook (now known as Meta), is receiving criticism for not knowing her history after she said women-led countries would never go to war.
“No two countries run by women would ever go to war,” Sandberg told CNBC anchor Hadley Gamble during a fireside chat on International Women’s Day, the outlet reported.
Sandberg also told CNBC she believed the world would be “safer” and “much more prosperous” if women were at the helm.
“I really believe that a world where women were running half our countries and companies and men were running half our homes would be a safer and much more prosperous world,” Sandberg said.
It didn’t take long for users on Twitter to suggest Sandberg check her history.
“Margaret Thatcher took military action during the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Her government had secretly supplied Ba’athist Iraq under Saddam Hussein with military equipment and partnered with the US by using the Royal Air Force bases for the bombing of Libya in 86,” a Twitter user identified as Kia Richards wrote.
“I’m sure that’s how she feels, but she should try backing it up with data. Research done so far says that’s not the case,” a user identified as Georges E. Banks agreed.
Even former “The View” co-host Meghan McCain chimed in to criticize Sandberg’s words as “sexist.”
“Margaret Thatcher, Indira Gandhi, Catherine the Great, Isabella, Mary, Elizabeth I, Boudicca, St. Olga of Kiev, Victoria, Elizabeth of Russia, Maria Theresa,” McCain tweeted. “This is a weirdly sexist statement from Sheryl Sandberg, implying women are too soft to recognize when war is necessary.”
Contrary to Sandberg’s stance that a world led by women would be more “safe” are the findings revealed in history professor and author Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers’ book, “They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South.”
In it, Jones-Rogers documents how white women not only owned slaves and profited from them but “were as brutal as men in their management techniques,” according to a news release from U.C. Berkeley.
Sandberg also said she believed the covid-19 pandemic was a “complete crisis for gender equality” that “wiped out three and a half decades of progress for women.”
Finally, Sandberg addressed Russia’s censorship of Facebook for adding fact-checking labels to media outlets’ content.
“Social media is bad for dictators. That’s why Putin took us down,” Sandberg said. “The scariest part of all of this is the lack of access. When we go down in Russia, people are losing their ability to actually understand what’s happening.”
PHOTO: Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg speaks at the American Enterprise Institute, Wednesday, June 22, 2016 in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
