Feminism, The Advocacy Of Women 's Rights On The Ground Of The Equality

Women have been fighting the fight for women’s rights for a long time. In fact, evidence can be traced back centuries of women’s desire for equality. Specifically, women have fought for their rights in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

The women’s liberation movement (or feminism as it is now known) of the 1960s and 1970s touched every home, business, and school (WA, 705). The movement even touched the sports and entertainment industries, in fact, “There are few areas of contemporary life untouched by feminism” (WA, 717). The word feminism in the early 1960’s wasn’t often used and when it was it was used with condescension or hatred. However, in the late sixties that changed thanks to a new group of women. This new diverse group of women included the: young, old, heterosexual, lesbians, working class, and even the privileged. This diverse group came together and collectively created the second wave of feminism.

Early feminism was typically focused only on white women, likely because racism was still extremely prominent at the time feminism began emerging. It was not until Kimberlé Crenshaw introduced the term “intersectionality” in 1989 that feminism started to look at oppressed group’s needs (Nash, 2008, 2). Intersectionality is a way of thinking that acknowledges that when a person has identities that belong to more than one oppressed group, it impacts their quality of life more negatively. In this paper, I will argue that intersectionality is important in the discussion of feminist theories and activism because it ensures that feminism is for all women, not just a select group of them. Intersectionality has changed the way the feminist movement handles the overlapping of different identities, which has helped feminist theorists understand the experiences of women of colour much more clearly. While intersectionality has a very important role in the conversation and practice of feminism, there are certainly critiques of the concept that should be brought up. These critiques, however, can offer a way to improve the study of intersectionality.

The Merriam-Webster definition of feminism is “the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes.” In the past century, gender roles have been challenged because of feminism. The very idea has completely flipped households, workplaces, and the general community and changed it for the better. A plethora of women’s movements were initiated in the 1960’s, and it gave people a look at how powerful women are when we stand united. Feminism has gained many followers in the past thirty to forty years as more people are becoming aware of conflicts pertaining to discrimination. However, there are many that were hesitant both in the 1960’s and in the present day, but for very different reasons. Nevertheless, persistence seems to be a beacon in women’s rights movements, thanks to very strong and level-headed role models.

Many radical feminist groups such as the New York Radical Women group (NYRF) gathered together as The Women Liberation Movement to protest against the deep-rooted conception of a “traditional woman” in the United States during the Second Wave Feminism (1960s-1990s). The Women Liberation Movement was a demonstration of challenging society’s common sense, or hegemony, which was nurtured by the dominant ideology which in this case was a gender hierarchy where men were believed to be superior to women. The primary source “No More Miss America” by Robin Morgan describes her experiences as a participant of the NYRF protesting against the Miss American Pageant in Atlantic City on September 7th 1968. The NYRF group discussed ten points of how the Miss American Pageant promoted the “traditional woman” stereotype based on racial beauty standards, submissiveness, and inferiority to men.

In her essay she relates the rise of feminist consciousness in the 1960s to numerous changes in American society, especially the rise of other protest movements. Echols said, “On September 7, 1968, the sixties came to that most apple-pie of American institutions, the Miss America Pageant” (Echols, 308). The reason she said this was because one hundred women’s liberation activists descended upon Atlantic City to protest the pageant’s promotion of physical attractiveness as the primary measure of women’s worth. From there, the protestors set up a “Freedom Trash Can” and filled it with high-heeled shoes, bras, girdles, hair curlers, false eyelashes, typing books, and representative copies of Cosmopolitan, Playboy, and Ladies Home Journal. They wanted to burn the contents but couldn’t because of the laws for bonfires on the boardwalk. Also, word had been leaked to the press that there would be a symbolic bra-burning. However, there were no bras burnt that day. But the image of the bra-burning, militant feminists remains part of our popular mythology about the women’s liberation movement. The Miss America demonstration represents an important moment in the history of the sixties as well as the women’s movement (Echols, 309-310).

On September 7th, 1968, hundreds of women gathered on the Atlantic City Boardwalk, carrying signs and singing songs that all had the main theme of protesting the Miss America Pageant. Later, they threw items of women’s oppression in what they called a freedom trash can. While the women who were apart of the Miss America Protest worked to defy society’s oppression and standards, they also marked one of the first explorations in the feminist movement. This certain protest helped to pave the way for many more women to come and impacted many of the basic ideas of fighting society’s norms.

Feminism has become an ugly word. Some say it does not even live up to its definition anymore. However, the definition remains unchanged in the pages of history. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary’s definition of Feminism reads, “The theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes.” If one digs deep into this definition, beyond the surface of society’s view on feminism today, one can see that feminism would benefit both sexes. The true ideals of feminism break down gender roles, thus benefitting men, women and future generations.

After women won the right to vote, the second wave of feminism began in the 1960s and continued on to the 90’s. This wave was highly associated with the anti-war and civil rights movement and the movement started growing conscious to a variety of minority groups all over the world. Out of three waves, the second wave’s voice was increasingly radical and theoretical as sexuality and reproductive rights were dominant issues. Protest began in Atlantic City in 1968 and 1969 against the Miss America Pageant. Many activists thought it to be a degrading “cattle parade” that reduced women to only objects produced by the patriarchy. Along with fighting against sexism in cartoons and politics, second wave feminists found their voice among other movements such as Civil Rights and the Anti-War movement. While the first wave was fought by middle class white women, the second wave invited and incorporated women of color and developing nations demonstrating that race, class, and gender oppression were all related and seeking sisterhood and solidarity (Rampton).

The term second-wave feminism refers mostly to the radical feminism of the women’s liberation movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s. We start our presentation of second-wave feminism with the first harbinger of a new feminism and the most publicized event in the United States: the protests associated with the Miss America Pageants in 1968 and 1969 (Freeman, 1975; (as cited by Three Waves of Feminism, 2015). Inspired by the tactics of the more activist parts of liberal feminism, radical second-wave feminists also used performance (e.g., underground or Guerilla Theater) to shed light on what was now termed “women’s oppression.”Redstockings, the New York Radical Feminists, and other significant feminist groups joined the 1969 protest to show how women in pageant competitions were paraded like cattle, highlighting the underlying assumption that the way women look is more important than what they do, what they think, or even whether they think at all (Freeman, 1975; (as cited by Three Waves of Feminism, 2015). Marching down the Atlantic City boardwalk and close to the event itself, feminists staged several types of theatrical activism: crowning a sheep Miss America and throwing “oppressive” gender artifacts, such as bras, girdles, false eyelashes, high heels,and makeup,

Feminism is the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes. In history, there have been several large acts of feminism that were needed for women's’ equality. The first major wave of feminism came around 1848, when the Seneca Falls convention took place and many women from around the United States went to discuss women’s rights. The outcome of the convention gave women ten new resolutions, while only one of them failed to pass, which was the women’s rights to vote. Seventy-two years after the Seneca Falls convention, another movement for feminism came into play, which was The Women’s Suffrage Movement. The Women’s Suffrage Movement started because while many of the American men who went to battle in world war one,

Women have been fighting the fight for women’s rights for a long time. In fact, evidence can be traced back centuries of women’s desire for equality. Specifically, women have fought for their rights in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

Many people are often misinformed or given bad first impressions of feminism. However, feminism is equal rights for all people of different race, sex, gender, and sexuality. Many of the people that give feminism a bad name, include a self-proclaimed feminist that is running for presidency, and meninists who are satirical equal rights activists. In reality, feminism is pro-gender equality and opportunities for all types of people.

When one hears the term “Feminism”, she/he may have the idea that it is the urge and

Throughout the last century, women have had to fight to have the same opportunities as men. Women have had to earn the right to vote, the right to have a career, and the right to autonomy. However, these are all rights that men have simply been given, which is why today’s feminists work to promote equality. Despite these efforts, feminism is often misunderstood and is interpreted with a negative connotation. According to a study conducted by Precopio and Ramsey (2017), “feminism is commonly recognized as a movement driven to grant social, political, and economic equality to both women and men.” The participation of others besides women is crucial to the spread of equality among the genders. Furthermore, the stigma and negative feelings surrounding feminism must be reduced in order for the ideals of feminism to have a greater impact.