Feminist Liberation Movement

As it turns out history really does repeat itself. As today we fight and most recently accomplished equal rights in the church. In the 1800’s we were fighting an equally important battle, equality for women. It is well known that women were second class citizen well beyond what anyone remembers. The movement to become equal citizens pressed through the 1800’s up until the Equal Rights Amendment for Woman was passed by congress on March 22, 1972 along with the Woman’s suffrage movement ratified on August 18, 1920. Up until these proud moments for America, it was up to brave individuals to make a stand for what they believed in and what they felt was right. Once word got out that woman were making a stand, women liberation movements began. Per

Throughout my selected text, Johnson focuses on the church along with the subsequent androcentric image of God, and how it impacts woman around the world. She explains that throughout history, with the help of the church’s patriarchal nature and society’s values as a whole, woman have been seen “as a ‘defective male’…that must live in obedience to her [male counterpart,]…[ and who are often also referred to as the] ‘second sex’” (Johnson 92). This

Professor of religious studies Karen Armstrong finds in the early Christian Church examples of hostility toward women and fear of their sexual power, which she contends led to the eventual exclusion of women from full participation in a male-dominated church.

Women have been active since the beginning of the early 1800’s and struggle until today’s day, to fight for equality. There were two women movement waves. The first wave was focused on the equality of the women by working on voting rights. The second wave from 1963 to 1982 concentrated on social issues. As in “Collective Action for Social Change”, Aaron Schutz and Marie Sandy stated in their book “women were tired of being second class citizens”. The civil rights movement spillover inspired women to create social movements by acting and building organizations focused on the issues that affected the women. The social issues were child care, domestic violence, contraception, and women’s health. One of the major topics that the feminists focused on was domestic violence that still exists in today’s day worldwide.

With the advancement of suffrage to equal pay, over the last century, women’s rights have progressed immensely. Through historic marches and demonstrations across the United States, women protested for their equal place in politics and social progress. Despite the fear-mongering components used in achieving these rights, women’s rights are still thoroughly debated within society today. Over the last century, incredible and unreachable goals have been fulfilled for women, such as the right to vote and a sense of equal state in the “Free World,” and can only improve in the years to come.

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.

When reading Lynn Japinga’s Essential Guide to Christianity and Feminism, there are many different lessons that you can take from it, ranging from lessons on what it means to be a feminist, what it takes to be considered a practicing Christian, and the many critics that both Christians and feminists face. Much like The Bible, the lessons you take depends on how you read it and what of your own knowledge and experiences you bring into the analysis. As someone who is on the forth year of sociology and gender studies programs, I went into the reading with a preconceived view on what it means to be a feminist and with knowledge of the potential dangers that women within Christianity face.

Lingering inequalities and other social trends from previous decades brought forth the modern feminist movement in the 1960s. These feminists campaigned for gender equality with causes such as equal pay for equal work, abortion rights, and social parity. In 1963, author Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique, which contained reports from a study conducted on female college graduates during the 1950s and early 1960s, which uncovered that most women labelled themselves exclusively as mothers and housewives, and were unsatisfied with the roles forced upon them. Friedan argued fervently that women needed to discover their own identities outside the roles of a wife and mother. Many believe that the arguments made in The Feminine Mystique marked the start of the modern feminist movement (Loveday, 1)

Wikipedia states, “…second-wave feminism broadened the debate to a wide range of issues: sexuality, family, the workplace, reproductive rights, de facto inequalities, and official legal inequalities. Second-wave feminism also drew attention to domestic violence and marital rape issues, establishment of rape crisis and battered women's shelters, and changes in custody and divorce law.” From there, Wikipedia goes on to discuss how most of those issues were addressed, though sexuality and family were not touched on much. In comparison, Spielvogal touches on nothing else besides Betty Friedan and the words of British Women’s Liberation Workshop, who said in 1969, “We are economically oppressed: in jobs we do full work for half pay, in the home we do unpaid work full time… We are brought up to feel inadequate, educated to narrower horizons than men. This is our specific oppression.” (p. 924). While this is true and informative, it misses vital steps in the

The Women's Right Movement has been a long enduring battle, which started in 1848 and is still something we are fighting for. Woman Rights in the 1970's wasn't the first wave of feminism which focused on suffrage;this wave was mostly focused on equal opportunity. This movement helped gain the ERA amendment which allowed women equal payment in working fields. This was extremely important because although women were already working and have always worked they weren't given enough credit.

The fight for women’s rights in America has been a long one, spanning many generations. It has been a little less than a century since women saw their first significant victory in the 19th Amendment, which acknowledged women’s the right to vote. Of course, women forged on, calling for more recognition and equality in the workplace, the classroom, and the church. Among them stood leading women like Mary Daly, who “trenchantly and thoroughly assailed the deification of maleness in the church” (West 113). However, these feminist leaders were predominantly white, middle-class women whose main issue was that they were women. In the mid-1900s, racism was still a normal part of American society, which was evident in the beginnings of the feminist

The major issues of the movement included the formation of antifeminist organizations, teenage pregnancy, and the legalization of abortion. Antifeminist organizations like the development of Happiness for Women (HOW) in 1971 believed in preserving traditional values of the family where the men were the provider, and the women were to be the housewife, mother, and homemaker. These members also believed in “God’s divine plan… removal of radical elements of Women’s Liberation Movement teachings from the schools… return to patriotism, and the election to government of men and women dedicated to God, Family, and the Country” (Day & Schiele, 2013, p. 351).

The past 50 years in America have seen incredible reformation and progress for women’s rights and their role in

The Women’s Liberation Movement greatly impacted Australia and the United States throughout the 60’s and 70’s carrying on to the 90’s. Without the Women’s Liberation Movement women wouldn’t have received changes in laws primarily regarding employment impacting on them moving forward in terms of equal opportunities. However there is still a there is still process to be made concerning employment and social roles for women to have equal rights as men. The Women’s Liberation Movement started in the 60’s during the second wave of feminism. Even though the 70’s were a time of change, both Australia and the United States saw women remaining in low status roles and staying primarily in the domestic sphere. The 90’s however saw a dramatic change in the amount of women employed and working more so in the domestic sphere.

Between the late 1700’s and the early 1900’s many American women struggled to obtain the same rights as men. The society of women as a whole had pushed for equality constantly throughout the years. Women especially obtained more equality by publicizing their reasoning and demands for equality. This, is first and foremost proven by the way women had advocated greatly for improved academics for women. Women used another good tactical approach to achieve equality by speaking out strongly against inequalities between the genders.A third example of a great leap for equality, would be the religious movement, the upsurge in religious enthusiasm allowed women to demonstrate their piety and even to found new sects; and this in turn led to change in the way the world viewed women.