Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
The role of women today
Female discrimination in employment
The role of women today
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: The role of women today
Is feminism still relevant? Feminism is the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes. It is not women trying to be superior to men, it is all about equality.
Do you think that just because women have gained the right to vote that feminism is no longer needed? Yes, we earned the right to vote but how long did that take? In modern day, a white woman earns 77 cents of every dollar a man makes. African American women earn 64 cents for every dollar a man makes and a Hispanic woman makes 56 cents. Many believe that women take different positions than men in the workforce, they work less or earn lower degrees, and that is why they earn less. But the wage gap refers to the amount of money women make within the same job
positions as men. Something that hasn’t changed in many households is the fact that women work less to stay at home cleaning, taking care of children, and cooking while the men work endless hours. Society believes that rape should be blamed on women because they aren't strong enough to fight a man off of them and that we need to lift weights so things like that won’t happen to us. But why are we at fault? A man shouldn’t be throwing himself on top of women, to begin with. If someone gets shot do you blame the victim? No, then why blame the women? Society teaches "don’t get raped" rather than "don’t rape". Advertisements also objectify women, in most ads you see a white, blonde, and thin women. Making it seem as though every woman should look like this. Advertisements like that make women feel insecure. Men often want a pretty, skinny girl with big boobs and a big butt. And yet they still wonder why girls are so insecure about their body. Also in most advertisements, you see women with flawless skin and no wrinkles. And people expect women to have no acne, wrinkles, or dark spots because that makes them ugly. Or that they should wear pounds of makeup to love how they look, or to get noticed by a guy.
On the contrary, women still get paid less than men. According to CNN Money, “men still make more than women in most professions -- considerably more in some occupations than others, according to a new study by the job search site Glassdoor”. Although we like to comfort ourselves with the idea that we have gotten our rightfully earned rights, we had not been given bathroom breaks until 1998. Furthermore, employees are still afraid to have a voice in the workforce. Employers establish rules that let laborers know that they are inferior.
For several decades, most American women occupied a supportive, home oriented role within society, outside of the workplace. However, as the mid-twentieth century approached a gender role paradigm occurred. The sequence of the departure of men for war, the need to fill employment for a growing economy, a handful of critical legal cases, the Black Civil Rights movement seen and heard around the nation, all greatly influenced and demanded social change for human and women’s rights. This momentous period began a social movement known as feminism and introduced a coin phrase known in and outside of the workplace as the “wage-gap.”
“Feminism”, as defined today, is “1: the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes,” and “2: organized activity on behalf of women’s rights and interests.”2 Many critics claim that feminism has been active longer than the word itself has existed.3 The word, “feminist” was not in true use until the late 1800s and early 1900s, but activism for women’s rights was alive and well a...
Most men and women today believe that we do not need feminism, that the world is fine. Sorrowfully they are far from being accurate. We don’t need feminism because it is about genders, we need it because it is about our society’s humanity. Women all around the world are denied basic human rights simply by the fact they are women which is absurd. For instance,
“In just about every state in the country, millennial women are more likely than millennial men to have a college degree, yet millennial women also have higher poverty rates and low earnings than millennial men” (Clark “In Every U.S. State, Women, including Millennials, Are More Likely than Men to Live in Poverty, Despite Gains in Higher Education”). Women are more likely to be below the poverty level because of age, race and religion. More so because they are women. “Since the 1980’s, fertility rates have steadily declined around the world. In the United States, the fertility rate is 1.9” (Josh “Gender Inequality and Women in the Workplace”). Women are not having as many babies as they used to. The United States has a lower birth rate because some females are trying to compete for a chance in the workforce. “Companies with three or more women on the Board of Directors average twenty-eight times more money” (Weisul “Women make companies more generous”). Women earn companies more money, but only 24 percent of CEO’s in the United States are women. If more women were hired for “higher up” careers, then most likely that company will make more money overall. As a result, inequality is not a new concept. It has been around for a very long time. It is slowly changing, but women want to change sooner rather than
Across the world, even in the United States, a paragon of progress, women in general are valued less than men because of… something. The origins of this rumor come from a combination of misleading information, the human need for self improvement and a progressive movement based around spreading awareness more than facts. When you grow up in a political bubble like Madison, you tend to hear more echoes than arguments and so when I began to learn about feminism in my middle school history class, the basics that I could gather was that people deserved to be equal and women were paid less than men. For whatever reason I never really questioned it and just believed that “things should change” without really knowing what things would need to change.
Ever since the women’s suffrage movement of the 1920s, there has been a push for eliminating sexism and providing equality between men and women, especially in the workplace. The United States, along with most of the world, has made great strides in gender equality since then. Women can vote, and have careers, and men are able to stay home with the children if they choose to. But are the sexes really equal now? There are three common answers to this question. Some say yes, while the most common answer is no. The debate does not end there, however. It is typically assumed gender inequality is oppressing women and limiting their rights. Regardless, there are those who say the system is harming men instead. So, if gender inequality still exists,
Women still get paid 77 cents to every dollar that a man makes. This not only perpetuates sexism in an extremely obvious way, it is also one of the most harmful. While being catcalled, or subtly put down can be a detriment to women’s psyche, the wage gap is harmful to a women’s physical and emotional well being. Most people say that in order to make a big career change, the person changing jobs should have enough money saved to live on for a full year. This is a pretty logical idea, however, this is something that is much easier for men to accomplish, given that they are paid a higher wage. They have the ability to put money away, whereas it is more likely that a women is going to have to spend all her wages just on living. She won’t be able to leave a job, even if she hates it, simply because she can not afford to. A man with her same qualifications may not have to worry about this due to the fact that he has on average 23 more cents per every dollar, than she does. This to me seems like the root of sexism, and one of the first things we as a society needs to fix in order to help woman feel more equal in the world.
Women are given a set of expectations, roles, and limitations within institutions run by men that have long been embedded into society and feminism seeks to change the unproportionate power which would ultimately lead to a more equally represented body of people. Feminism is a tool that can aid women in abolishing all the connotations that come with gender. In One Is Not Born A Woman, Monique Wittig argues that "To refuse to be a woman...does not mean that one has to become a man," to refuse to conform to the ideal images of women, and to break free from the social constraints, stereotypes, controlling images, expectations, and oppression from social institutions does not mean becoming a man. Feminists aren 't aiming to make everyone a man, it does not aim to "bring down" men or favor women, its goal is to liberate all oppressed groups because the privileges exclusive to men "should be considered as the entitlement of everyone" according to Peggy McIntosh in White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack. Feminism today is very important because it is not longer exclusive, and advocates for fairness for all (people of all ethnicities, any race, any religion, any social class, community, sexuality, etc). Instead of excluding people with different identities or
When I hear the term Feminism I automatically think its about doing things for women, and what they stand for, so I didn't really have a good idea about it. So I went online and looked it up. "Feminism consists of ideas and beliefs about what culture is like for women just because they are women, compared to what the world is like for men just because they are men. In ethical terms, this form or aspect of feminism is descriptive. The assumption in feminism is that women are not treated equally to men, and that women are disadvantaged in comparison to men" (http://womenshistory.about.com/od/feminism/a/feminism.htm). I have to say I definitely agree that women and are not treated the same as men, and I don't think we ever will. Theres a saying I believe it is "its a mans world", I don't know if I believe that. I just feel like men were always held
In the workplace, women do not receive the same benefits that men do. Some women do the same job, for the same amount of hours, and still do not receive the same pay for their work. Is there a specific reason behind this? No, it is just one of the many inequalities that goes on on the job. As pointed out in the essay by Susan Faludi, Blame it on Feminism, women earn less. The average women’s paycheck is twenty percent less than their male counterparts. Men with only high school education’s make more than some women who have graduated college. Most women are still working the traditional “female” jobs: secretaries, teachers, and nurses for example. Construction work, engineering, and doctor’s, are considered “out of our reach” and men’s jobs. Women are very capable of doing these jobs, but most times when applying for a “man’s job” are not taken seriously. American women are more likely not to receive health insurance and twice as likely not to draw pension then American men. They face the biggest gender-biased pay gap in the world.
70 years after the American Revolution, white males enjoyed freedoms they viewed as their god given rights, but woman were somehow left out, they even seemed to be excluded from the constitution (“All men are created equal.”) “After so much had been done to ensure America’s freedom, it was hypocritical that woman were not allowed to vote, married woman had no property rights, and husbands possessed so much legal power they could beat or imprison their wives on a whim. Even most professions were closed to women, it would be unheard of to see a woman practicing medicine or law. The jobs that were available to women only paid a fraction of what the men were making.” [Eisenberg] This made women completely dependant on men.
The word feminism is sometimes misinterpreted and associated with female superiority and hatred of men, although most people probably agree that feminism can mean the desire for social and economic parity. There is so much baggage surrounding this term that clarification of what feminism is and is not, is essential. Indeed, the way feminism has developed has not been pretty. “Feminism over the years have [sic] evolved away from its noble purpose of creating awareness and defending women rights to creating new ridiculous ‘belief systems.’...feminism has become more like a medium for angry women to vent their hatred and frustration towards man”(“Feminism is Chauvinism”). This definition goes completely against the true meaning of what feminism entails. Feminism can be defined as a fundamental respect for others and the desire for equality between men and women.
Feminism is defined as the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes. It began as an organized activity on behalf of women?s rights and interests. This concept was developed to help women earn a place in a predominantly male society. Unfortunately over the years, the intentions of feminism have become distorted, not only by anti-feminists, but also by the feminists themselves. The principle of equality for women and men has turned into a fight in which feminists wish to be better than men. Feminism has been twisted and misunderstood so much that it has become a harmful idea.
Throughout the 19th century, feminism played a huge role in society and women’s everyday lifestyle. Women had been living in a very restrictive society, and soon became tired of being told how they could and couldn’t live their lives. Soon, they all realized that they didn’t have to take it anymore, and as a whole they had enough power to make a change. That is when feminism started to change women’s roles in society. Before, women had little to no rights, while men, on the other hand, had all the rights. The feminist movement helped earn women the right to vote, but even then it wasn’t enough to get accepted into the workforce. They were given the strength to fight by the journey for equality and social justice. There has been known to be