preview

How Far Do You Agree That Women Had Made Significant Gains in Their Fight for Equality by 1980?

Better Essays

How far do you agree that women had made significant gains in their fight for equality by 1980?

Equality is ensuring individuals or groups of individuals are treated fairly and equally on the grounds of their race, gender, religion, disability, age or sexual orientation. One such group of individuals who are in an unremitting fight for equality in context of gender and race are woman within the United States exemplified by the World economic forum global gender gap report of 2015, ranking the country 28th in terms of equality between men and woman. Although in terms of the global demographic the ranking appears adequate – impressive even by some accounts, the unwavering determination of the feminist movement leading up the 1980’s, …show more content…

However due to the disproportionality among the number of female voters especially among Black, Hispanic and Native Americans most of whom remained in a fixed position on the lower demographic of the class table as well as resolute same sex opposition, most notably from anti-suffragist Alice Hay Wadsworth, whether or not these gains were significant is highly debatable.

Six decades later in 1980, and America has experienced a deceptively lucrative economic boom, the most devastating financial crisis in world history and two World Wars and through it all, females and males alike have campaigned tirelessly for and against the advancement and equality of women, which posses the figurative million dollar question - How significant have woman’s gains been in their fight for equality by 1980?

At the forefront of the argument is the societal ideology of the American people during the era, most of whom were trapped in a traditionalist mind-set, one that required them to disregard generations of social norms, which had been subconsciously spoon-fed to them through media advertisements such as billboards and magazines most notably Cosmopolitan and Woman’s Journal, that had set a psychologically restrictive standard about what was acceptable. Following the baby boom of the 1960’s with the birth of a massive seventy-six million children, the American people were clearly in a mind-set of traditional family

Get Access