If you ever happen to open a history book, the concept of patriarchy would strike you as a blatant feature of a male dominated society. Women have always been denigrated as the weaker sex, which falls in line with their biological makeup. This however, does not give men a license to exploit women. Since the time when human settlements began to crop up, women have been considered as the private property of men. Considering the multifarious atrocities committed against women, the success of the newly founded feminist movement is a testament to the burgeoning desire among many women to set things right for once. The movement has come a long way since its establishment but to say that equality between the genders has been achieved would be like stretching truth to the breaking point. Women received the vote in Denmark and Iceland in 1915, The USSR in 1917, Austria, Germany and Canada in 1918.French women did not receive the vote till 1945. Lichtenstein was one of the last countries, in 1984.
The change in the fortunes of women can be traced to the outset of the World War 2 which led to increased need for personnel in the armed forces. Enter women who seized the opportunity with both hands and usurped the position of men in the labor market. The popular icon Rosie the Riveter became a symbol for a generation of working women Even when the war veterans returned, the majority of the women retained their jobs and the newly found grip in the labor force.
The feminist movement was spearheaded, in the first stage by Virginia Woolf and the right to vote was the major issue that was promulgated by the feminists. The presence of a political voice ensured that the rights of women were not condoned during the decision making process. In the 1960’s, the second wave of the feminist movement in the United States began. Unlike the first wave, the second wave of the 1960’s was focused on many complex social and political rights. The liberationists of the 1960’s aimed to completely rework the way that women were treated and perceived by their community. Impetus was provided by Betty Friedan's 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique, which blamed the society for the multitude of problems that beset women. This book proved to be a watershed in the feminist awakening to the ground reality. It called for women to accept social roles equal to that of their male counterparts and to shed the housewife stereotype, a factor ensuring that patriarchy becomes the order of the day in millions of households. The next step was to fight against discrimination in the workplace. Although, many employers do state in their job advertisements that the organization is an equal opportunity employer, this in itself does not serve to justify that bias and chauvinism is a thing of the past. The third wave of feminism was a direct response to the perceived failures of its antecedent.
Despite the fact that women can now vote and drive and have increased presence in normally male dominant sectors like the military, the claim that women no longer face any discrimination at home and work is a far cry from the stark reality that still ensures that behind the façade of development, there lies a male dominated society. As exemplified by the thought of a leading feminist; the way ahead is very long and tiring but we can rest assure that the journey towards an egalitarian society has begun.
Maybe a lesson or two of human psychology would help us understand why males have treated their counterparts as noxious insects. As history testifies, males always did the more dangerous jobs while women were happy to take care of the children. This built an aggression inside the human male, an aggression that found its expression through beating wives at home. This ingrained belief in the fragility of women, corroborated by their biological makeup, has infused of concept of male superiority in our subconscious mind.
Often the reason why females have not been able to articulate their rights is a self image that they concoct for themselves. Such an image enjoins that transgressing the rules of patriarchy is a crime that would be in a direct conflict with the social norms. A Vindication of the Rights by Wollstonecraft saw that it was the education and upbringing of women that created their limited expectations based on a self-image dictated by the male gaze.
The school of thought called functionalism in the realm of sociology partly explains there is such a proclivity to conform to existing standards of acceptable behavior. To speak against your husband would be considered as the height of debauchery even in a world that prides itself on its ability to treat both the genders equitably. This leads us to the conclusion that women can only change their life chances by transmuting their attitude towards their roles in society.
One of the most misguided notions of conventional wisdom is that men have both a physical and mental edge over women. Nothing could have been further from the truth. In stark contrast, statistics corroborate the fact that women have overshadowed men in academics. The unwarranted notion that men are physically resilient may hold some veracity but this does not override the fact that women outlive men on average. The global economic crisis has proved to be a metamorphosis for the fate of countless women around the planet. Considering the fact that females are becoming important contributors to the world labor supply, their burgeoning purchasing power lends credence to their invisible powers. As history marches on, woman's presence in all walks of life will make them a potent and powerful group .This is a far cry from the 18 century when even the basic civil right of suffrage was denied to them, a fact that testifies to the success of the feminist movement.
The Feminist movement has many obstacles in its way among which internal disagreement stands out in prominence. It is no secret that there are disparate ways to achieve gender equality which elucidates why disputes about the plausible ways to move ahead remains a matter that is open to ferocious debate. Add to this the differing racial and geographical interests and you get a quandary which leads to the middle of nowhere.
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