America entreats people from all over the world due to its well-deserved reputation of freedom and liberty. As a nation, we fought against such evils that had the power to radically change this nation, but to our luck, we have remained a nation in which free will is celebrated and pursuing your own aspirations unites Americans together. Here you can choose what to do with your life and how to live it. This freedom is what others around the world crave. However, despite the array of rights American citizens receive, there is no such thing as a perfect nation.
Deep in the roots of the United States, one issue in particular has yet to be resolved, and it is a topic that needs to be addressed with urgency in our community. This issue is women’s rights. It is a fact that women have battled through the worst of oppression and now receive more privileges than ever before. The feminist movements led by Susan B. Anthony and others have made a drastic change to United States history. But if we truly focus on a woman’s current political and social situation, it is evident that women are still not equal to their male counterparts.
I see it in newspaper articles, in real life, in shared personal stories. There are clear differences in the image of a female compared to that of men. Economically, women receive 79 percent of what males receive when working the same jobs. Some might argue that this is because of the occupations a woman decides to pursue, but in reality, the real reason is due to gender discrimination in the workplace. We may not want to admit it but our male-dominated mentality is that women, because of their ability to bear children and other factors, they are viewed as an unreliable source of labor. Clearly there are several outliers to this situation, but for the most part, this monetary disparity is present in America’s economic system.
In addition, being a female, especially a feminist, brings about stereotypes and crude images. As nice as America would like to be, we have a tendency to “slut-shame” women and objectify their bodies in this patriarchal world. For example, the media manipulates a woman’s body to sell products such as hamburgers and shaving cream. These model figures are then the ideal image for a women, making men believe that all bodies are the same. Because this objectification has not ceased, girls are shamed into trying to please their society, some by the means of starvation or bulimic actions, thus making young women feel more self-conscious than necessary.
Women are entrapped in so many injustices, and I have only outlined a few problems women face. As a democratic society, I do believe that change is necessary to uplift the veil from our nation and become a truly free and non-discriminatory example for the rest of the world. If we decide to be stubborn in our current ways, change is inevitable. And women will rise to redeem the rights they deserve.
