If you’ve read any of my previous columns, you can probably guess I like to write about topics involving feminism, and I generally take a strong feminist position. Obviously, I identify as a feminist, and as I’ve written these columns, I have gotten positive feedback.
But whenever I mention feminism or being a feminist to anyone, I get a negative reaction.
Such as the text from my brother that read “Oh, you’re a feminist?” with a laughing emoji next to it. I find myself constantly explaining to people I’m not that type of feminist, which I absolutely hate saying.
Why is there this negative connotation surrounding feminism? Why am I being judged for identifying as a feminist?
I want to shed light on feminism, not only for the family member and friends who read my columns, but for everyone else as well, in hopes of combatting this negative stereotype surrounding feminism.
First, we have to look at the history of feminism to truly understand where it’s come from and how far we have come.
Feminism has been described as coming in distinct waves, each wave with a new goal and demeanor. The first wave of feminism began in the late 1800s, and is best known for its feminist suffragettes.
These women began rallying for a change for equality for the right to vote, which was marked by the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848. This first wave not only called for equality of men and women in voting, but was also the first time black and white women banded together in search of equal rights and abolition.
These suffragettes and abolitionists won women the right to vote in 1920 in America and began the revolution for women in the search for equality.
Then began the second wave of feminism, which is believed to have started the negativity surrounding feminism in the 1960s. During this time, women still didn’t have a lot of the rights men had. “Head and master” laws and many common laws would permit husbands to act as “head of the household” and maintain control of earnings and property.
Women were expected to simply get married, have kids and take on all of the housework and childcare while their husbands worked. If women were fortunate enough to have a job, they were confined to limited job positions and were paid less than their male counterparts.
This is where radical feminism was born, along with the stereotype of bra-burning, anti-man, politics-of-orgasm feminism. Although I think these radical reactions were hardly unwarranted with all the injustice women were forced to experience. I can’t imagine how men would react if they didn’t get their way. But wait, I can, because that’s war.
We are now believed to be in a third/fourth wave of feminism, but without a clear determinacy between the two. The third wave is said to have an empowering position on gender, sexuality, identity, class, ethnicity, etc. This wave appropriates sexist terms such as “slut” and “bitch,” according to Martha Rampton, a history professor and director of the Center for Gender Equity at Pacific University.
The fourth wave derives from the third wave with a deeper focus on sexual and violent abuse against women, unequal pay, slut-shaming, the beauty ideal, reproductive rights, etc. It’s no longer considered extreme to talk about these things.
We are not haters of men; rather we invite men to join us in our feminist activism, and many have. Feminism isn’t only for women, and we fight on the basis of intersectionality.
We fight for everyone to be free of oppression, and if you aren’t in that fight then you’re against us.
prhurst@indiana.edu
@IDSPeyton
