Listen to your local feminist
Has the feminist movement gone too far? To even begin to answer this question we must start from the beginning. From 1848 to 1920 the first wave of feminism started, this consisted of a focus on legal issues and primarily gaining on women’s suffrage. The second wave of feminism consisted of the 1960s to the late 1980s. Within this time many books like The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan came out. The movement began to focus more on social issues, equal treatment, and discontentment within women and their households. In the 1990s is when the third wave started where liberation of your own body and abolishing stereotypes was the main focus. Which leads us to the 4th and current wave of feminism. Key issues such as rape culture, harassment, and sexual assault started to be more discussed upon. This also is in a time where social media has been heavily used in order to spread messages to more people.
Throughout each and every wave there has been some sort of outrage or discontentment from people not a part of the movement but recently, more than ever, we see people being extremely enraged. Now, of course, the basis of what most feminists are striving for is needed, but in a society where only the bad is shown, more and more people cringe when we hear the word “feminism” or “feminist”. This is the outcome of what many people have nicknamed “feminazi”. This term was started by a Conservative radio show host named Rush Limbaugh. His personal definition is “radical feminists whose goal is to see that there are as many abortions as possible”. Though despite his definition, Now in today’s society Feminazis are seen as anyone who hates men with a passion and that women are superior in all ways instead of equality. An example of a woman who has been keyed this is Andrea Dworkin. She in all wrote 10 books relating to feminism. One extreme quote from her is “Men especially love murder. In art they celebrate it. In life, they commit it.” From quotes like this person specifically, men see all feminists as men hating whiners. When in fact the true meaning of feminists is the advocacy of women’s rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes. Now more than ever though the connotation behind feminists is often met with negative thoughts and feelings.
Women like her are not the basis of what feminism really is and why it was and is needed. In early times women had no rights. They couldn’t own their own house, they couldn’t own any of their own stuff let alone work a job. Men owned them. As they were children their fathers owned them. Then once they became women and they got married their husband owned them. Not only that but they couldn’t vote either, this is what keyed the term “women’s suffrage”. In 1777 the law was passed by all states to not allow women the right to vote. In 1839 Mississippi took the first stride in making laws more equal by granting women the right to hold properties in their own names but only if their husband permitted it. By 1869 Arabella Mansfield became the first woman lawyer in the US. In the 1900s the US grants married women the right to own their own properties under their own name. Only by 1920 did women get the right to vote. In 1923 the first equal rights act was formed ensuring men and women have equal rights in every subject. Throughout these years more and more women continue to gain rights and begin working jobs never worked before, but only in 2013 was the ban against women in military combat removed. As of today that was only 6 years ago, women were able to serve our country.
Some say that with all this progress done it sounds as though there’s no longer a need for feminism. The fact of the matter is women still face injustices. We see commonly in society see men praised for the number of women he’s slept with but women degraded and shamed for muttering even such thing as a body count. Women all over the world are shunned for sexually liberating their own bodies. They are rather seen as objects and a game to play. With several condescending and demoting phrases such as slut, whore, and hoe others will always use these to break down women. Indeed the connotation now associated with a feminist is horrid and would be sufficiently better to gain a new word all together but why allow a small group of people ruin the entire word. We don’t associate the KKK with Christianity despite them claiming Christianity as the reasoning behind their killings so why allow a few crazy feminists to completely destroy the word and its long history of positivity. Although in theory, it could be beneficial to change the word to something else we need to combat the connotation instead. In order to truly be able to change, and truly change the way society works we have to stop running from things that scare us or slowly became negative.
Feminism is not a scary thing nor is it meant to be demeaning towards men. As I’ve discussed many mutually beneficial benefits have come from this movement. To erase the history behind this word and all the work the women put in upon this movement is an injustice towards these women. No matter the connotation the feminist movement needs to stay alive. Women are still facing injustices, women are still being objectified, and women are still not being treated equally. Until all of these injustices are battled the movement must continue. We cannot allow a few bad apples ruin a whole batch. We live in a society where everything is cherry-picked to suit the eye of whoever is viewing. When we strive for equality we strive for human rights. If we give up this fight we give up humanity. I urge you to take this knowledge and reach out to truly knowledgeable and reliable intellect to continue your education on the subject and continue to prosper for enlightenment.
