Plato And Feminism

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I have hence suggested that it is possible Plato has relied on the entailment between these two terms; if rationality was innate to Kallipolis, there is reason to believe that Plato understood that the obliged role in the state is exactly what his rational citizens would have chosen autonomously, thus the argument against his being a feminist for the lack of attention on autonomy is incomplete. Having pointed this out, however, it remains true that Plato has never explicitly posed an argument for the sake of the autonomy of women – or for men, in any case – and hence his status as a feminist is still unlikely to be true.

This leads on to the last point Annas has proposed; Plato, indeed, has never argued for the justice of women, which is the central theme in Republic - he argues for the sake of benefiting the state, rather than equipping women with rights. Here, similarly, Annas has not eliminated the possibility that Plato believes enacting on the justice for the state would induce justice for individuals, and if it is possible for such a link to exist, her conclusion that Plat...

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