Tuesday, October 14, 2014

I am a Feminist?

Feminism is a huge topic lately that everyone seems to have an opinion about.
I used to tell people I was a feminist a couple years ago, but because of the mad attack of conservative women I was under I quit talking about it unless someone made it a point to ask me. Now that I'm forming a better idea of what the word feminist really means I've decided to be open about it once more.
I think it's a difficult topic, but only because not everyone is on the same page about what feminism is in the first place. So to start this discussion let's look at the true definition...

Feminism: "The doctrine advocating social, political, and all rights of women equal to those of men."
(According to Dictionary.com) 

Yes! I agree with feminism. Of course I want women to have a vote, I want women to be treated respectfully, I want women to be taken seriously. In this way I think feminism is good. There are women all over the world living in terrible conditions with unreasonable rules and requirements put on them that seem to have hardly a voice in any matter. We need to fight for women everywhere to be heard.
However, a lot of people have a much different picture of feminism. I've noticed many putting too much focus on the social equality part of feminism and doing so in the wrong light. Many celebrities have been fighting for the cause in TOTALLY INAPPROPRIATE ways which gets a lot of attention and distracts from what the mission of feminism actually is.
Women are so confused as to what they want. This is not news. We are totally conflicted and unclear most of the time. When it comes to feminism you'll hear many different views. Women say...
Our bodies are over-objectified. We want respect.
Guys party and sleep around and it's totally fine but when girls do we're called whores.
We can use our bodies to our advantage. It shows that we are strong women, and proud of it. 
These three things are totally conflicting one another, yet most young girls today would probably agree with all of them.
In my opinion women should be treated with the same respect as men, but neither man nor woman should behave in certain ways. However, I'm not everyone's (or anyone's) mom, so not much I can do about that part of it. What you and I can do is promote feminism in a way that gives respect to men and women.
Really each individual can have a slightly different take on feminism, some emphasize the political freedoms it carries, some the social, and others the educational benefits and so on. But when it comes down to it feminism is simply believing that women deserve the same rights as men.
I have included a bunch of quotes and ideas others have expressed that helped me figure out what my opinion on the matter is. I realize some of these ideas mentioned below I have not yet touched on, they are to get your brains thinking. There are many subcategories within feminism which I hope to get to in the future!
Please leave your thoughts below, I know this is a very hot topic lately! What is your opinion?
Hope these blips help shed some light on feminism and get you thinking about its importance.





1 comment:

  1. I think every Christian should be a feminist. The Feminist movement that we know today has it's roots in Christianity. Sadly the feminist movement today often shoots past the mark. There is a Jesus feminism, and there is a secular worldly feminism. Often times times Christianity is torn down in the name of feminism. So the thing that originally championed woman's rights is torn down in the name of woman's rights.

    Here is a great teaching name: Why We Believe in Women in Leadership by Faith Forster.
    http://ichthus.org.uk/resource/?sermon_id=179

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