Feminism: Empowerment or Oppression
I was raised as a feminist before the term ‘feminism’ was mainstream. My mother looked at my family women who felt that they were subservient to men and decided something needed to change.
In the late 70’s, my mother was born in a family of a young teenage mother and her teenage father, who were forced into either marriage or an abortion. They decided on the marriage, though were divorced shortly after because my grandfather was abusive toward my grandmother. My grandfather gave the same ultimatum to my own mother when she was pregnant at fifteen-years old. My grandfather tried to raise my mother to be someone who felt that women belonged in the home taking care of a husband and children, just as his family believed. But using the wise words of my mother, she said, “fuck that,” and raised two daughters to be strong and independent women who never needed to rely on anyone, no matter what.
My mother made us into the type of people that could be role models for young girls and women of all ages. Because of this, I’ve received numerous messages from not only my tumblr page, but even personal friends, who have commended me on being so outspoken during a time of harsh politics. My mother never wanted my sister and I to be like she was – a stay-at-home mom with four kids by the age of twenty-two – if we didn’t want to be. My mother has never been a stagnant person, and she didn’t want us to settle.
Obviously, I have my own opinions on the matter of feminism. This isn’t just about my opinions, though. This is about other’s opinions. This is about making up your own opinion using the ideas others share.
I’ve always believed feminism to be equality between the sexes. Helping to raise women up in the patriarchy and even helping men. While women have their issues with being disrespected and sexualized, men have issues when it comes to showing their emotions.
I believe feminism to be empowering to women. I believe it shows that women don’t have to be any different than men, and they don’t have to change. My little sister doesn’t have to babysit our cousins while the men move mattresses, she can help just as much – if not more since she was a competitive cheerleader and weightlifter in high school – as the men can.
But not everyone has the same concept of feminism. Some are similar, but everyone has their own version of what it is, just like everyone has their own version of religion. I’ve come to the conclusion over the years that some people don’t believe in the legal definition of feminism, that is, equality between men and women. Some reject the definition flat out.
And I’ve learned that many people these days don’t want to claim feminism as a title of theirs simply because of the negative stigma, though they do believe in gender equality. Rejecting the title of feminism doesn’t mean they don’t care, it just means they don’t consider themselves a feminist.
After making a post on tumblr, I became more aware of what many call “tumblr feminism”. I had never thought of others believing women to only want benefits to equality and not the consequences as well. I’ve always believed that if men have to sign up for the draft, women should be required to as well (but I don’t believe in the draft for anyone). That a male abuser should receive the same punishment as a female abuser. Some have lashed out at me and said I’m a supporter of the patriarchy because of this. Most have given their support on the matter. Some have even said I’ve given them faith in modern feminism because of my stance on the matter.
I’ve said so much about how I believe feminism to be, but it’s about time I get to the other opinions I mentioned earlier. I spoke to several different people on the matter of feminism*. I wanted to get plenty of different opinions about why they do or do not believe in it.
On tumblr user, content-stunner, says, “I belie[ve] that feminism is the fight for women to have what men have always taken for granted”. A sweet and simple idea of why this user supports feminism, and it brings up the great concept of women fighting for rights, such as voting, that men have always had given to them.
@silverthewolf2202 says, “feminism to me is just the idea that women are equal and should be seen like they are humans and can do the same as a man”. This is brought up well with the general idea of feminism – sometimes known as gender equality. They follow with, “I also think they shouldn’t always be so sexualized in movies”. There has been constant debate on women being oversexualized in video games with female character’s body armour, as well as female actors being sexualized for commercials and such.
Now, I wrote this next paragraph before Carrie Fisher passed away, but I want to include the original paragraph anyway. I had actually written this just days before she passed, and I wish she would have had the chance to see it.
“I don’t know if any of you are Star Wars fans, but when I saw the new one (no, not Rogue One), I heard people comment on Carrie Fisher’s “dwindling” looks more times than I can count. But no one said anything about Harrison Ford (may Han Solo rest in peace) and Mark Hamill wasn’t in it until the end, so you didn’t even really get to see him, but I know he’ll be in the next one. I think the only beneficial thing from Carrie Fisher’s aging is that Star Wars doesn’t oversexualize her like they did in the older movies anymore.
Carrie Fisher, you’re amazing. Don’t let people hate on your looks. You’re a mature woman who has aged gracefully. I hope you’re in the next Star Wars movie.”
An anonymous user stated, “I think feminism is very important because we live in a world where women still aren’t equal to men. To me, feminism is about making the world a better place for women in the future”. There are a lot of people who don’t agree with feminism because they believe they live in a world where women are equal to men. Many people like to believe that things like gender wage gaps and glass ceilings don’t exist.
Another anonymous user states, “I understand why they picked feminist, because the text-book definition of feminism implies what they’re trying to do; they want equality across all genders”. This viewpoint is particularly interesting because the anonymous user happens to be a man. I wanted to include a man’s opinion on the matter since the majority of feminists voicing their opinions happen to belong to women. He continues, “[S]ince you have that minority group of feminists that are the loudest and talk over everyone else (…) a lot of people who aren’t overly involved in it see feminists as not-good people (…) making other feminists look bad. And other feminists (…) just ignore it, but nothing ever really happens because the only people you see are the over-reactive people that are going to get offended by something and throw out tweets, Youtube videos, and comment on someone, when any intelligent and real feminist is the last to respond – not because they aren’t active, but because they are going to take their time and think about what they’re [saying] so they can get their words across without being taken out of context.” He finishes with, “[y]ou can do the whole feminist movement thing without calling yourself a feminist. You can call yourselves whatever and it shouldn’t matter. You have feminists and anti-feminists who believe in gender equality. For me personally, I agree with gender equality one-hundred-percent for every gender (…) not just male and female, but female to male – [trans men] – and male to female – [trans women] – but I wouldn’t call myself a feminist because of the minority that makes the group look bad and I’d rather personally just stay out of it”.
It was a long one that I’ve had to reduce, but I think he speaks volumes about the subject. To tell you the truth, this anonymous user and I were up for three hours in the middle of the night hashing out the subject and it was while he was talking that I started taking notes on his words. After we had finished our discussion, I asked if I could include what he said in this and he said yes. I’m glad he did.
Another anonymous user said, “[f]eminism is standing up for what is right. It’s fighting for fair and equal treatment of women and against systematic oppression” and that, “[f]eminism is something that shouldn’t have to exist, because men and women should be considered equals in all respects”.
The last user I was able to get into contact with is a user by the name of @loudlytransparenttrash. This person is an anti-feminist who I believe had a lot to bring up on the subject. However, their post was very long in what they had described to me, and I unfortunately can’t include all of it. However, if you were to message them, I’m sure they would be just as kind to you as they were to me and let you view the private post.
loudlytransparenttrash begins with, “I was a feminist for many years and I have plenty of feminist friends so I have nothing personal against individual feminists”. I believe this is one of the reasons they were so willing to speak with me, as other anti-feminists I reached out to for the purpose of this piece were unresponsive.
They continue with, “What is the definition of feminism? I have no idea. Why? Because not even feminists can decide on a definition and stick to it for more than a second. When prompted for the definition of feminism, most self-proclaimed feminists will trout out the very nice sounding ‘belief in equality between the sexes’ line”. They continued with, “there is (…) the real definition: feminism is the pursuit of unlimited rights, privileges and power for women and women alone”. Honestly, this is the definition of feminism I see most often on tumblr.
“Feminists set the trap by saying feminism’s on the side of truth and equality, and if you don’t call yourself one, it means you favour women being sexually harassed, assaulted, or worse (…) Believing women deserve equal treatment and rights doesn’t make you a feminist, it makes you a regular, everyday decent person,” loudlytransparenttrash continues.
“Feminism for what it used to be is finished in the first world. That brand of feminism is over (…) Today [feminists] try so hard to keep themselves in the past world of oppression and inequality while forgetting that they are some of the most free, capable, equal and privileged people in the world. Real feminists are ashamed of what they women are doing with the freedom and rights they once so vigorously fought for.
“Modern feminism has become beyond embarrassing. There’s a reason why so few women identify as feminists: it’s less a true ‘women’s movement’ and the public face of hysterical leftist intolerance (…) Feminists point to the wage gap, glass ceiling, women’s vulnerability to sexual objectification, rape culture, mansplaining, street harassment and before long you have constructed a full-scale patriarchy (…) You can still believe in equality without believing in feminism,” loudlytransparenttrash finishes.
As I said before, I did leave out quite a bit of loudlytransparenttrash’s original post, since I believe it was almost 3 pages long on its own. But, as I also said before, if you speak with them directly, I am sure they will link you to the original post.
As you can see, feminism for everyone is different, like loudlytransparenttrash said before. There are different ideas associated with feminism. Some believe it to be empowering, others believe it to be oppressing.
With all these different ideas of what feminism means, from feminists to men to anti-feminists, I encourage you to find your own idea of what feminism could mean to you.
*All non-anonymous users have agreed to be named prior to the writing and editing of this piece.
