Feminism in 1968
“In short, feminism, which one might have supposed as dead … is again an issue. Proponents call it the Second Feminist Wave, the first having ebbed after the glorious victory of suffrage and disappeared…” -Martha Weinman Lear, writer for the NYT.
This was published by the New York Times in March of 1968. Many believe this year to be the one of burning bras to advocate for equality (and it was), but mostly it was a year of protests and marches led by women.
The National Organization for Women (or NOW, for short) spent part of the year protesting the meetings for the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission on sex discrimination in the workplace. “Twelve, comely feminists,” as Lear put it, brought signs to “crash” the meetings to get attention, for the Commission was mainly represented by men. NOW also picketed the New York Times headquarters for advertising gendered Help Wanted sections, as allowed by the E.E.O.C. The women of NOW declared that this was in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination based on sex in the workplace. These women were ridiculed.
A more left-leaning group for women’s rights was the Radical Women, a group siphoned out of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). Anna Koedt, a member, stated in ’68: “‘We believe in a total change in the social structure to achieve total equality of the sexes, so that men and women will be free to come together in more humane, meaningful relationships.’” Sound familiar?
A second article from the New York Times discusses a protest of the Miss America Pageant in Atlantic City, NJ. According to Charlotte Curtis, writer, “Women armed with a giant bathing beauty puppet and a ‘freedom trash can’ in which they threw girdles, bras, hair curlers, false eyelashes, and anything else that smacked of ‘enslavement,’ picketed the Miss America Pageant here today” (1968).
These women (approximately 100 members of the “Women’s Liberation Movement”) felt that the beauty standards of the day were too high for most women to attain, and took action. They protested the misogynistic tendencies of the Miss America Pageant by burning the material items they were taught to use to satisfy men. They were incredibly peaceful, solely partaking in what they called a “symbolic bra-burning” and singing not much louder than the regular bustle of the boardwalk.
At the same time, a different protest was occurring down the street. The country’s first Miss Black America Pageant was happening at the Ritz Carlton. These black women felt the need for positive representation in the media, especially considering each finalist for the official Miss America Pageant was white. The organizers of the alternative Pageant said that they weren’t attempting to protest beauty, they were simply trying to bring attention to the mostly ignored beauty of black women.
It is easy to see the parallels between the feminism of 1968 and the feminism today. While it is plain that women have made many advancements in our country — like having non-gendered Help Wanted ads — we know that there is still a long road ahead of us.
Sources:
Curtis, Charlotte. “Miss America Pageant is Picketed by 100 Women,” The New York Times. 7 Sept 1968. Nytimes.com. Accessed 16 Apr 2018. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/09/08/90036144.pdf.
Lear, Martha Weinman. “The Second Feminist Wave: What do these women want?” The New York Times. 10 Mar 1968. Nytimes.com. Accessed 11 Apr 2018. https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/03/10/90032407.pdf.
