Gender Equality And The Rights Movement

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.

“No Society treats its women as well as its men” is a quote from the United Nations Development Program when they were asked about the issue of gender inequality, which was featured in the Chicago Tribune News. Fifty years earlier, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which specified that everyone, regardless of gender, was entitled to the same rights and freedoms (The Universal Declaration of Human Rights). Fifty years later though, countries are still falling short of achieving the goal of gender equality. Many find it hard to believe that the United States is among the countries that have yet to fulfill the goal of achieving gender equality. Women began the fight for equality in 1848 by

In today’s society, people believe women have the same rights as men, especially after the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964, which outlawed “discrimination based on race, color, religion, or national origin” and was amended in 1975 to include the word “sex”.(“Teaching With Documents: The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission”). The word “sex” was added at the last moment. America does not promise an equal outcome for everybody, but America was founded on the idea that everybody should have an equal opportunity to achieve their dreams. America is the home of freedom, the home of many opportunities, and the home of equality, but we are not where we should be? Many citizens of America are unaware of the unequal

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"(US Declaration of Independence). Equality is a fundamental principle that has helped form our law system to what it is today. Since the Declaration of Independence we have been able to expand who should be included when our law system addresses equality. Today law, regarding gender equality has progressed significantly. Examining American history, it is evident to notice oppression women's faced from the time prior to the Declaration of Sentiments in 1848 to the Civil Rights act of 1964 and even today in some instances; the strive for equality amongst genders is a conflict that has come a long way, but still needs to be addressed accordingly.

The woman 's rights movement and the demand for woman suffrage emerged in the first half of the 19th century from a variety of other movements. A major goal of the woman 's rights movement was to change public opinion regarding women 's capacities and rights. Suffrage was one of several reforms intended to end the significant legal, political, religious, and cultural discriminations against nineteenth century women. Suffrage became the primary goal of the woman 's rights movement during the 1850s and remained so until women finally achieved the right to vote in 1920.During 20th century they gained the right to vote and also more occupations were opened to them. They gained equal right with men included property right, the right to work for equal pay, and the women’s suffrage. It was so difficult for women to gain suffrage because the people believed if women could vote they would end barriers at the state level that prevented married women from controlling their wages and attending state universities, they reform the corrupt practices of American politics, and they would end unequal pay. Suffragist always believed that success was imminent, and they numbered their amendment to prohibit discrimination in voting on the basis of sex the 16th amendment. But votes for women came so slowly that they followed changes legalizing an income tax, authorizing popular voting for United States senators, and establishing prohibition. Suffragists faced endless campaigns to persuade state

The divide between genders has been fought over for many years, dating back to the 1800’s where families started to grow and an income increase was needed, as a result women began working alongside men in factories, but for much smaller pay. As the world started to modernize, social norms related to women started to change. Women were granted the right to vote through the nineteenth amendment and were provided access to health care and birth control. Women should be seen as equal to men and given equal opportunities.

This investigation has enabled me to gain a perception into some of the techniques used by certain historians, as well as to the difficult task that historians encounter when undertaking historical investigations. I feel I have developed the skill of critically and carefully analyzing sources which is essential in the study of history. In order to carry out this investigation, I read books by well-known and praised historians on the subject of women’s rights and analyzed statistical evidence.

In discussing the original debate surrounding the women’s suffrage movement and women’s equality we need to distinguish there are two distinct sides, for and against. People may insist on acknowledging the existence of varying degrees of support for either side, but for the sake of this conversation, we will recognize the prominent two. The first side, in the support of women’s equality, believes that women are people, the same as men, and deserve the same freedoms and liberties as their male counterparts. When discussing women’s right to vote and the suffrage movement Susan B. Anthony questions, “…Are women persons?” and follows with, “I scarcely believe any of our opponents will have the hardihood to say they are not. Being persons, then,

Women’s suffrage, and gender equality, is one example of contemporary events repeating history because there were similar struggles between the early 1900s and today. Starting in the 1900s, women’s suffrage was still highly controversial, and ridiculed in the press. Women’s suffrage, the definition obtained in the dictionary, is the right of women to vote (The Definition of Gender Equality). Women’s suffrage, and various gender equality associations, were unpopular for many reasons: some feared the equality would destroy families, others did not want women drafted into war and granted special privileges. Through that all, women still kept their eyes on the prize. They sought equality and the right to vote, the right to be equal

Since the beginning of time mankind has been divided and categorized based on gender. Starting from birth males and females are assigned roles based are expected to act and adhere to stereotypes given to that sex. Only in recent times have either gender stepped outside of the gender boundaries. However, despite the new sense of individuality society tries to restrict them to gender archetypes. Males are expected to be masculine and females are expected to me feminine and if either tries to be the other they are told its wrong. There is so much inequality in society today, even beyond the binary gender . Transgender persons also experience inequality in equal parts as cisgendered people. In most cases though when the topic of equality is brought up the conversation transitions to feminism, almost ignoring transgender. Inequality equally affects everyone not just females. Despite the inequalities genders face, improvement can be seen. Although there are arguments that say there are areas in American society where there has been very little advancement, there are some areas where there has been major increase in gender equality especially for women rights, women in government, women in the medical field, and transgender equality.

For many years, society’s view of gender was a simple matter of assigning the appropriate roles for both men and women. In this way, they are defined in an important way based on their gender. However, many studies over the last decade have altered society’s view by showing how gender is a cultural invention. These studies have also demonstrated how men and women are shaped by the culture and environment they’re born into and that what is expected of them may differ from what we deem to be appropriate in our culture. In today’s world, we still are dealing with the same problems that we were hundreds of years ago. These problems being equal rights between men and women, along with breaking away from societal norms revolving around what is expected

Women are not as equal as they should be because discrimination follows women to college, to the workplace, and to the army. For America is a democracy that should to treat everyone the same no matter their gender, why are women not included in this democracy? How would the pioneers of the Women’s Rights movement feel about women not being treated equally after they put their hearts and souls into obtaining equal rights? Is all of their hard work for nothing? Society, in general, should continue to strive for equal rights in order to carry on the dream of the pioneers.

Throughout many decades women have been struggling to be equal to men, both at home and in the work place. Women have come a long way and are certainly fighting to gain that equality, but gender roles are very important in our society. They have become important in life from birth, and society continues to push these gender roles. The treatment of the male gender is very different from that of the female, and this issue has become very important to me, as a woman. As children we learn and adapt to specific gender roles, and as we grow they become more evident and more important to our role in a society. There is a lot of discrimination against the female gender. Carol Gilligan argued that

At the time of equal rights and gender equality it is clear that there are still steps to go though in this matter. Even in the democratic countries the thing did not evolve as expected: there are only a few women holding broad position. According to the Guardian1 for the last twenty years women representation in middle an top management has highly increased but not so much in top management where they are still underrepresented. In fact, the average proportion of women in middle and senior management sector is 24% (Saab, M. 2014) whereas there is only 5% (Allen, K. 2015) of woman CEOs in the world largest corporation such as the international labour organization even says that it will take at least a hundred years before parity is achieved if we don’t speed up the machine with extra effort in this matter.

Urban families have no qualms sending their girls to school and more and more rural families are also sending their girls to schools. This changing social trend is reflected by the indicators. The girls to boys enrolment ratio in primary schools in 1990 was 0.56 but in 2005 was 0.86. 9 Similarly, the ratios for secondary schools in 1990 was 0.43 and rose to 0.82 in 2005.9 The ratio for tertiary level education in 1990 was 0.32 9 and in 2008 was 0.41.10 Ratio of literate women to men in the age group of 15 to 24, the second indicator, has also jumped from 0.48 in 1990 to 0.73 in 2005.9