Feminism

Feminism originally was an expression used by suffragettes to obtain the right for women to vote in the early 1900s in the United States and the United Kingdom. The movement has changed over the years and is aimed towards extending more fair reproductive rights towards women, equal pay, and bridging the social gap between men and women by incorporating them into the concept of equality, among other things. Many question whether feminism should be referred to as "humanism" because the name suits the purpose more thoroughly. However, the name feminism has stuck for now due to the history behind it.

Specifically, a modern feminist tends to:

• believe that there are no inherent differences between men and women
• oppose the concept that women are weaker than men and always need their protection and guidance
• view traditional marriage as a patriarchal institute
• believe that women do not have to adhere to traditional gender roles
• support affirmative action for women
• believe that women should be able to choose between being a housewife or holding a career
• feel that women should be able to dress as they please, and not be confined to dresses or skirts
• seek women in combat in the military just like men, and coed submarines
• enjoy the option to choose whether or not she takes her husband's last name when marrying

History

Roots of the movement in the United States and the United Kingdom include the Women's Suffrage movement of the early 1900's and the Women's Liberation (or "Second Wave Feminist") movement of the 1960's and 1970's.

The Equal Rights Amendment, which proponents claimed would address the inadequacies of the Fourteenth Amendment concerning women and citizenship, was proposed in the US in 1923. The amendment passed Congress in 1972 but was ultimately defeated, falling just three states short of the required three-quarters majority on June 30, 1982. Some conservatives, particularly Phyllis Schlafly, felt that its passage would entail several consequences, including making girls subject to the military draft, requiring taxpayer-funded abortion the end of single-sex schools and classes, requiring the issuance of homosexual marriage licenses, and the revocation of laws that protect women in dangerous jobs, such as factory or mining work. Indeed, in states that passed their own state versions of ERA, several of these results were subsequently ordered by courts.

The feminist movement in the West evolved in the 1980s with the rise of so-called Post-Feminism (also called "Third-Wave" feminism), which stresses that women have many rights that go unrecognized, often by women themselves, in everyday life, and in the American legal structure. Most members of the feminist movement support reproductive rights currently guaranteed by American law, including the legal right to abortion. This stance is opposed by many conservatives, leading political commentator Rush Limbaugh to coin the term "Femi-nazis" to refer to extreme feminist activists.

During the administration of Bill Clinton, feminism made a partial resurgence, but feminist leadership largely failed to criticize President Clinton's sexist behavior toward female employees as both Arkansas Governor and U.S. President.

Quotations

Jessica Valenti

• "If we can't be critical of ourselves and recognize our weaknesses, how can we be effective as a movement?"

• "A lot of women want to be mothers, but there are also plenty of us who don't want to have kids. But for some reason, that's seen as unnatural"

• "I think that romantic relationships or life partnerships are important parts of our lives-but they're not the only part. Women are being taught that all we're worth is what guys think of us...When you learn from an early age that the best a girl can hope for is to be desired by boys, you're going to do everything you can to make sure that you are desired. Period."

Marilyn French

• "To nourish children and raise them against odds is in any time, any place, more valuable than to fix bolts in cars or design nuclear weapons."

• "All around the world, men place all or most of the burden of raising children and maintaining the home on women, but pretend that this burden is not work; they do not reward it as work or count it as work in global accounting, in either developing."

Other

• "I wish someone would have told me that, just because I'm a girl, I don't have to get married." ~Marlo Thomas

• "Feminism is the radical notion that women are people." ~Cheris Kramarae and Paula Treichler

• "You don't have to be anti-man to be pro-woman." ~Jane Galvin Lewis

• "It was we, the people; not we, the white male citizens; nor yet we, the male citizens; but we, the whole people, who formed the Union.... Men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less." ~Susan B. Anthony

• "Instead of getting hard ourselves and trying to compete, women should try and give their best qualities to men - bring them softness, teach them how to cry." ~Joan Baez, "Sexism Seen but not Heard," Los Angeles Times, 1974

• "Most women are one man away from welfare." ~Gloria Steinem

• "We ask justice, we ask equality, we ask that all the civil and political rights that belong to citizens of the United States, be guaranteed to us and our daughters forever." ~ Susan B. Anthony, Declaration of Rights for Women, July 1876

• "People think at the end of the day that a man is the only answer [to fulfillment]. Actually a job is better for me." —Princess Diana

• "The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlearn." —Gloria Steinem

• "There never will be complete equality until women themselves help to make laws and elect lawmakers." —Susan B. Anthony

• "Remember, Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in high heels." ~Faith Whittlesey

• "I, with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength, who makes enormous demands on me, who does not doubt my courage or my toughness, who does not believe me naïve or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman." ~Anaïs Nin

• "The world has never yet seen a truly great and virtuous nation because in the degradation of woman the very fountains of life are poisoned at their source." ~Lucretia Mott

• "Women are not inherently passive or peaceful. We're not inherently anything but human." ~Robin Morgan

• "I've left Bethlehem, and I feel free. I've left the girl I was supposed to be, and some day I'll be born. ~Paula Cole, "Tiger," This Fire

• "Feminism is a social movement whose goal is to eliminate the oppression of women in all its forms." - Amy Kesselman, Lily D. McNair, and Nancy Schniedewind, eds., Women: Images & Realities, 1996

• "Feminism is the political theory and practice that struggles to free all women: women of color, working-class women, poor women, disabled women, lesbians, old women-as well as white, economically privileged, heterosexual women." -Barbara Smith, ed., But Some of Us Are Brave: Black Women's Studies, 1986.

• "Feminism is an attack upon social opinion wherever it discriminates in its attitude toward man and woman on the basis of sex." -George Middleton, early 20th-century playwright, speaking in 1914.

• "Feminism has fought no wars. It has killed no opponents. It has set up no concentration camps, starved no enemies, practiced no cruelties. Its battles have been for education, for the vote, for better working conditions.. for safety on the streets... for child care, for social welfare...for rape crisis centers, women's refuges, reforms in the law." (If someone says) 'Oh, I'm not a feminist,' (I ask) 'Why? What's your problem?'" - Dale Spender, author of For the Record: The Making & Meaning of Feminist Knowledge, 1985

• "We are all benefiting from the great feminists who struggled and suffered and worked to give us everything women now enjoy... I refer to myself as a feminist, and I do it with pride." - Cybil Shepherd, feminist

External Links

• The Feminist eZine Archive of articles about Feminist History.
• Gloria Steinem and the CIA, The New York Times, February 21, 1967.
• Inside the CIA with Gloria Steinem, Nancy Borman, The Village Voice.