Women are extraordinary! We are astoundingly beautiful and delicate, yet, like the flip-side of a coin we can be incredibly fierce and strong. We have endured a great many hardships, from only being seen and not heard, to wearing sharp whalebone corsets that damage the organs by custom, to the harsh torrents of water from hoses during the National American Woman Suffrage Association, to caring for ourselves during the days of Rosie the Riveter. We have evolved greatly from those generations. Today, we can sit pretty in a pair of Levis and toss our votes in the ballad box. Today, the possibilities for women are endless. Women can be the bosses of big name companies just as easily as men. Today we have a woman nominee for president! I do believe with every fiber in my being women are extraordinary… but I do not call myself a feminist.
How can that be? What, am I nuts? As much as I strongly admire women such as Josephine Butler, Frances Cobbe, and Florence Nightingale, whom all ushered in the rights we women have today, I cannot with a clear conscience call myself a feminist by today’s standards. Feminism defines itself as the advocacy of women’s rights on the grounds of social, political, and economic equality to men.
However, some feminist groups currently show very little care for equality and more so for extreme, man-hating feminism.
As a female, disagreeing against a few aspects of this hoop-la marks me as a traitor to my own gender in the eyes of these groups, which I am not. I do believe women deserve just as many rights as men. I do not agree with the lower pay wages that we women receive for doing jobs alongside men. Conversely, I don’t see the harm in every now and then catering to your family and beau. By saying this, I’m not enforcing that we women should take to being like the "Stepford Wives," completely helpless when it comes to opening jars and changing tires.
No, I’m saying perhaps instead of going out of our way to demonstrate our likeness to men we should strive to see ourselves for what we are. Women. Happy, beautiful, intelligent, capable, women. Inside us dwells the spirits of Cleopatra, of Joan of Arc, of Artemisia, and Queen Elizabeth. These ancient women didn’t let their gender enable them.They didn't compare themselves to men of power. They did not burn their bras, or refuse to shave their underarms to prove their points. They recognized and understood the property of their own distinct essence.
I would rather be like those woman any day, an equalist, rather than a feminist any day.
