It's OKAY to Empower Women

No matter what the issue is, it is important to learn from the past and fix the problems happening now so that everybody can progress towards a better future. Feminism is a big topic of discussion in the United States and has been for many years, as women have fought for equality for as long as anybody can remember. There is a rich history of feminism in America with different aspects and different issues being fought for such as the right to vote and the right to an education. However, the one specific area of feminism that I would like to focus on took place after World War II in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s.

During this time period, according to Betty Friedan, author of “The Feminine Mystique”, nearly every woman in America dreamed of being a suburban housewife and mother. They dreamed of the lifestyle where they kissed their husbands goodbye every morning as they went off to work and then spending their mornings and afternoons cooking, cleaning, and taking care of their children. Throughout these years less and less women were attending college and were getting married at younger ages. If women did attend college, it was just to try and find themselves a husband or obtain a degree that taught them on how to be a good wife. Colleges even had dormitories that were specifically for married couples. This is crazy to think about considering that just a century earlier women were fighting for higher education.

Friedan also wrote that it was considered very “unfeminine” to want to get a degree in anything other than being a housewife. If you were a woman and wanted to be a doctor or scientist it was embarrassing and considered un-normal. Women back then were scared to further their education because they didn’t think they would ever get married if they were smarter than men. It was thought that women had achieved “full feminine fulfillment” when they were healthy, physically attractive, educated (but only to a certain extent), and only had concern for her husband and children.

This is how it was for several years. There was never any discussion as to whether men or women were equal because they were just considered different. It was believed that they had different roles and that although men made the final decisions at the end of the day, women could still incorporate their opinions into things like financial expenses. Advertisements pushed women to live like this even further. Millions of American women wanted to live like the lady in the images who has a permanent smile plastered across her face while dropping her kids off at school, made their homemade food, sewn their clothes, and used their brand new washers and driers. The link below provides many examples of the different ads used to draw women into this lifestyle.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcreativepro.com%2Fheavy-metal-madness-a-woman-s-work-is-never-done%2F&psig=AFQjCNGBzanM7mN7GVlQFR4jU37a0D4Rsw&ust=1474313340671650

However, the article states that after a while, women began to realize that something was off. Slowly, over time, more and more women got the feeling that there was more to life than cleaning the same things every day and cooking the same recipes every week. Of course, because they had been taught that they only needed a husband and kids to be happy, many women felt ashamed that they weren’t satisfied by their lack of identity outside of the household. Some went to doctors and psychiatrists to figure out what was wrong with them. Doctors would prescribe medicine that was supposed to perk up the woman’s mood if she took it every morning. Others suggested ways to improve the women’s sex life. However, none of these things seemed to be working in the long run.

Women lacked true identity in themselves because they were seen as nothing more than a mom and a wife. They didn’t have a job title that helped them identify with themselves or any hobbies. If they tried to talk to their husbands about their feelings of incompleteness or emptiness, they just didn’t understand. Many women thought that what they needed to do was have another baby or move to another house but there was no tangible thing that could help them with this problem.

Things didn’t start to look any better for women until they started going back to school, getting real careers and not just random side jobs, and learning to live for themselves before they got married and started having kids. This isn’t to say that it’s wrong to want a husband early on in life but it’s also okay to want to be single and pursue a career as well.

When thinking about feminism in the twenty-first century it’s not hard for anyone to recognize that it has a little different look. Girl empowerment is everywhere and it encourages girls to be strong, independent, goal-achieving women. Some believe that it’s good because it motivates girls to want to be the best person they can be. Others say that it’s wrong that we have to advertise these things towards women because you never see commercials with little boys stating that they are going to be the president when they grow up. However, my argument is that people are overthinking feminism and that no matter what it looks like, not everyone is going to be happy with it. I personally see nothing wrong with the methods that are used to build women up nowadays and think that there should be more of them. To me, there is nothing wrong with hearing success stories from other women because it does nothing but prove that women are just as capable as men are.

There is a Twitter page called Feminist Frequency that is an educational nonprofit page that aims for “a more equitable media landscape and online world”. The page features the accomplishments of women all over the world and gives women the attention they deserve for their great successes. Here is a link to the Twitter page: https://twitter.com/femfreq

Here is an example of the way that the Twitter page empowers women by tweeting about women who have made a positive impact for women everywhere.

https://twitter.com/femfreq/status/775476652251811840

In addition to tweeting about the success of women everywhere and from the past and present, Feminist Frequency also started a new video series on their YouTube channel called “Ordinary Women”. This series will feature women activists in the past and present who have helped the feminist movement and have helped pave the way to equality for all women. The first video featured a women named Emma Goldman. To watch the video, click this link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1IiRssfp4U&feature=youtu.be

Twitter pages like this are important because they teach girls on social media of the different ways they can be successful and that they are capable of anything they set their minds to. It is a lot different mind set than most people had back in the 1950's but things have changed for the better. Because of Twitter pages like Feminist Frequency, girls can grow up knowing that they are capable of so much more than just cooking, cleaning, and satisfying their significant others and their children.

References

Feministfrequency. "The Revolutionary Life of Emma Goldman #OrdinaryWomen." YouTube. YouTube, 10 Sept. 2016. Web. 18 Sept. 2016.

Frequency, Feminist. "Emma Goldman Was One of the Most Boldly Revolutionary Voices of the Late 1800s. Https://t.co/wiqVvw4wyw Pic.twitter.com/xAUTL1pJIp." Twitter. Twitter, 12 Sept. 2016. Web. 18 Sept. 2016.

Friedan, Betty. "Chapter One." The Feminine Mystique. New York: W.W. Norton, 1963. 15-32. Print.