Feminism began as a movement for women's rights and equality in society. However, feminism today is a disparity of what it used to be. In America and other countries across the world women are gaining their freedom of speech and their right to stand for what they believe in. However, instead of fighting for those who are still oppressed by what once afflicted them, these women have chosen to use their voice to fight for trivial issues in comparison. This is the wrong kind of feminism.
It is wrong because this type of feminism no longer stands for equality. Aside from the persistence to break the glass ceiling, women have left equality behind in pursuit of bigotry. Those who don't agree with them are seen as not only wrong but "oppressive" and "sexist," which is an alarming and slippery stance to take. Feminists should not be entering certain fields or workplaces to prove a point, nor wearing specific clothes to get a reaction and call someone out. Feminism should be and is truly about equal freedom and rights to pursue whatever a woman may choose with equal opportunity. Furthermore, their success should be based solely on their own ability and adequacy in executing what they are doing and not due to quotas, controversies, or allegations of anti-feminism.
I think movements such as "free the nipple" and the "slut walk" are excessive and inessential to what the feminist goal should really be. If you look back throughout history, you will see that women started the feminist movement to gain equal rights and equal pay, not for the freedom to walk around without their breasts being covered or to biasedly vote for women in elections solely because of their gender without consideration for their actual qualifications for the job.
Now, I am not saying all women that are feminists do this. For example, I consider myself a feminist, just not in the way society has come to understand it today. I think that feminism should be less about a women's sexual freedom and inclusion in different fields, and more about fighting for equal pay, equal rights and opportunities for education, and freedom of choice when it comes to marriage and pregnancy.
It seems that our society has forgotten what true oppression is, especially when concerning women. Biological differences and the limits that they create are not oppression. Being catcalled on the street is not oppression.
If you want to see oppression, if you want to see what feminists should really be fighting against, look at the lack of female rights in other countries and cultures. Females, even as young as seven, are married off against their will and as they grow up they are deprived of proper education. Many women are saddened when they have a baby girl and not a boy because their culture and society does not view them as equal. These babies' birthdays are sometimes not remembered, and some women, once they are older, are required to hide their entire face.
So if you want to fight for women, fight for all women. Look beyond yourself to the women who are still struggling against real oppression in other countries. Fight for them to have equal rights and opportunities in their society and culture; the same rights and opportunities many of you are already granted because of those who came before you.
