FIVE THINGS FEMINISM HAS DONE FOR ME

Only five things? Well, I haven't been tagged yet but here goes: 

1.   Feminism has given me the opportunity to pursue my God-given talents and my calling.

2.   Feminism has given me the opportunity to be happy as a married woman and to enjoy all my relationships with male friends and colleagues, knowing that I interact with them from a position of equality.

3.  Feminism has given me the freedom to say yes to sex and the freedom to say no to sex.

4.  Feminism has given me the opportunity to push myself to the limit in athletic competition. 

5.  Feminism means that my career, and my interests, and my family role, and my economic life, have not been forcibly defined for me based on my sex. 

Via Feministe.  I tag all of you. 

Comments

[AndiF]

Feminism's gift to me is that events from my life sound now unbelievable:
1. No mother will ever find out like mine did when my father died without a will in 1962 that she has no legal relationship to her own children, will never have to go to court to be named legal guardian to them, and will never need to carry around the legal documents to prove it.
2. The straight A older sister of someone's best friend will not be told she won't be allowed to go to college as she so desperately wants because it only makes sense to save the money for the C- son.
3. Mothers won't be advised not to put daughters in talented and gifted programs because "it's wasted on girls" (mine didn't listen).
4. Young women won't hunt for summer jobs through newspaper classified ads separated into "Men Wanted" and "Women Wanted".
5. Women graduating from college won't go into the Career Placement office at the university and have the first question asked be "How fast can you type?".

[puglette]

Feminism gave me:
1. (as a teen) The example to question many of my father's 1800s era opinions, especially in regards to politics, race, and women's roles. Later I learned control over my volume level...

2. (at age 18) I became the first woman in my family to get a driver's license, a car, and later graduated college, in a field I chose! A younger cousin recently became a fireman; I'm so damned proud of HER!

3. (at age 22) The ability to ignore my father's disapproval because I decided to "live in sin" (his words) in Boston with a man who 20 years later, is still a very dear friend. My father said, as the relationship broke up, "Why would he marry you if you were putting out for free?" REALLY. Yet his own mother, then 80+ years old, had laughed at that notion and said she wished she "could have lived with a man first"...died at 95; tough, sweet lady we nicknamed "The Little General", who shook her head often about some of her son's opinions.

4. (at age 24) The confidence to ignore Dad and move across the country to live with another boyfriend (SHOCK! newly DIVORCED!), my husband of now 14 years. We lived together for 3 years before we married, have been business partners, parents, best pals and worst enemies, depending on the day. While my mother feels she has to "ask permission" from Dad, my husband and I laugh over the idea of him controlling or "letting" me do anything. Hell, she didn't even have a license until she was 50 and goes NOWHERE w/o his OK.

5. Lastly, at age 41, comfort in who I am, the ability to be cordial with my father, and the desire to learn as much as I can (in part from sites like this and its links), so our daughters can make informed, intelligent choices in their own lives and take responsibility for them. They will always have their mom and dad's support. I agree with AndiF; it does sound so odd, doesn't it?

[LauraJMixon]

Beautifully put, HF. Thanks for sharing that.

-l.

[will]

Feminism has given me:

1. diaper changing
2. clothes washing
3. dish washing
4. cooking responsibilities
5. keyboarding skills

I wouldn't trade it for the world.

The idea that a woman cannot be as smart me, as hardworking as I am, or as interested in sex is just ridiculous.

I also find it ridiculous that someone could be a better parent than me simply because they have a vagina and I have a penis.

[annamal]

1) The vote (and two female prime ministers in succession)

2) A family which moved halfway accross the country so my mum could pursue her study

3) A steady well paid job in a traditionally male area.

4)A voice and the chance to be heard

5)The oppurtunity to avoid having children ( while endlessly admiring those who do)

[Cassandra]

Feminism has given me:
1. A tool to fight back against society's image of what my body should look like. I don't always win the battle, but at least I have something strong to fight with.

2. An inability to be intimidated by someone just because he's a guy. I wish I could transfer this to my girlfriends who say they have trouble talking to guys (not even guys they have crushes on, which I could understand--just guys! in general!); their complaints always make me want to scream, THEY'RE JUST PEOPLE LIKE YOU AND ME! This also goes for girls who feel that classroom discussions (when people aren't adhering too strictly to being called on) are male dominated. If you have something to say, JUST FREAKING SAY IT.

3. A healthy relationship to sexuality: freedom from guilt or fear of pregnancy, the knowledge and ability to use protection, feminist-influenced boys who won't pressure me into anything I don't want to do, and the ability to teach those who will what's what.

4. The strength of mind to, when a guy recently "accidentally" groped me at a dance, grab his arm, look him in the eye, and say "That was my breast you just touched. If you do that again, I will slap you across the face." And to mean it!

5. A totally awesome mom who provided me with the groundwork for all of the above.

[Starfoxy]

1. The literature (and freedom to read it) that showed me the abusive and controlling habits of a man I nearly married, allowing me to break up with him before I made any comittments.

2. My name is on the title to everything we own, and will be mine should my husband die.

3. The freedom to attend college, to recieve scholarships, and to have female mentors in a traditionally male field.

4. The knowledge that I look just fine without makeup. (I should also include gratefulness for a husband that has never critiqued my appearance, but has expressed honest concern for my health when my weight has dropped to unhealthy levels. I don't know if that's feminism, or just great parenting on the part of my in laws.)

5. Happy memories of playing competetive team sports and being taken seriously.

Remember who had the rumble with Vox? Well, someone is getting him today. He keeps deleting the comment...but they keep reposting.

He wrote: "It's also interesting to note that there appears to be some evidence that the popular saying is incorrect and behind every great woman is a man doing at least some of the actual work.

Einstein would be Einstein without Mrs. Einstein. Would Marie Curie have won her Nobel prizes without Pierre?"

Someone posted this from another site and said: The Man behind the accomplishments of Vox:

"Bartholomew's Notes on Religion has an very interesting entry about WorldNetDaily columnist Vox Day. While we knew that he was, in real life, Christian sci-fi novelist Theodore Beale, we didn't know that his father was millionaire Robert Beale, a board member and stockholder in WorldNetDaily.com. I had always wondered how Vox got the WorldNet gig (not that he isn't a provocative and and often times intelligent columnist in his own way, but he just didn't seem to be a fit for WorldNet). So, this would at least explain how his column came to the board's attention."

People in glass towers should not throw stones.

I've noticed his followers have not commented on this...can't see their hero go down I suppose.

This one is fun too!

"The cited contributions are insignificant, that's what made it post-worthy in the first place."

Madame Curie (Nobel Prize winner and the one who worked with radium), Queen Elizabeth, Joan of Ark (fought off the French invasion by the English), and the world famous Coco Chanel are all insignificant? Just when you think feminists make statements that are not too bright!

[Richard]

Interesting question for a man to answer, because it asks a selfish question, What has feminism done for me? So, selfishly, I’d have to say that it’s made women better friends and colleagues to me. I’ve always had more female than male friends, and to be quite honest, I generally prefer their company to men (I'm admitting here a preference based on sex. Does this mean I'm sexist? Guess so.) But I can’t imagine I’d relate very well to women who were culturally and socially restricted from the life men experience. There would be little common ground. Women able to think for themselves, and experience life in any manner they define for themselves, are to me far more interesting people, and I think, more valuable friends.

[ballgame]

Richard: I agree. (Boy I feel funny saying that.) I hope that at some point in the future men will eventually be granted permission to be as emotionally alive and as fully human as women are.

The basic feminist exercise of flipping the gender of pronouns and re-evaluating a social expectation has been an eye-opener for me — for both sexes — since I started doing it in late adolescence.

[mythago]

What hasn't it done for me, really?

[Antigone]

1. When my parent's decided they wouldn't support me for college, feminism gave me the ability to pull loans out in my own name.

2. And I can go into aviation without the professors being allowed to force me out of the class.

3. When I critique a professor for being sexist, I have a leg to stand on.

4. I am not pregnant.

5. And I can be friends with guys without being thought of as a whore.

[Dodo]

first off: "I wish I could transfer this to my girlfriends" cassandra, oh you take the words out of my mouth!!! on how many, many various occasions did i think exactly this?

okay here's mine:

1.) A LOT of my self-respect and therefore self-confidence and self-loving has its roots in feminism. without it... i dunno where i would stand now.

2.) encouragement. empowerment. lots and lots of it. daily. sometimes feminism is the only thing that keeps me going on.

3.) i don't have to go through things like my mom had to (premaritally pregnant at 18, in the 60ies, in a suuuuuper conservative town, which is located in a really catholic region, forced to marry at 19, divorced 4 months later. even nowadays - and shes one strong woman, believe me! - she almost doesnt talk about this time at all. people who had been friends with her refused to even speak with her when people got to know she was pregnant.). and feminism also gave me a fucking strong mom who survived all this and never gave up, who always pursued what she thought was the right thing to do, the best thing for her to do - with all consequences.

4.) awareness. before i came in touch with feminism (as a movement) i didnt see a lot of things, even though i've always been a very critical and open minded thinker (again: thanks mom. and thanks dad.) it gave me so much awareness and insight of how many things still go wrong in our society, although everyone tries to tell you we've already achieved everything.

5.) lovely scenes like the following:
even though i'm only in my early twenties, my grandma (86 years old) is sooo worried that i have no boyfriend and that i might "end up" unmarried or alone for the rest of my life.
granny: "are you gonna come over on sunday?"
me: "no, felix will visit me"
granny: " your boyfriend?"
me: "no, just a friend"
granny: "you can tell me! i will keep it to myself!"
me: "hey only cause its a male friend doesnt mean we automatically have a reationship. if i go out with karin, you also dont ask if i'm lesbian!"
granny: "you're lesbian???"
me: "no im not!"
granny (obviously very disappointed!): "oh. but you should be! at least then you wouldn't be alone anymore."
haha i LOVE her!!
and without feminism a sentence like this wouldve hardly been uttered by a lady this age. :-)

[j0lt]

Feminism has given me:
1. The ability to pursue a career that uses my talents.
2. The ability & knowledge of how and where to obtain contraceptives not only as a married woman (they used to only permit married women to get them back in my mom's day) but before I became sexually active in my teens.
3. A husband who was raised by a feminist mother and is a strong supporter of feminism.
4. Fabulous supportive friends who share common principles and who, when we get together, are all in the kitchen cooking & cleaning (& laughing!) regardless of gender.
5. A mom who supported me in all of my academic and career endeavors, who worked the entire time I was growing up (for a while as a single mom) so I knew first hand that having a mom who works outside the home is no big deal despite the articles you read all the time.

[dragonsmilk]

1. The assumption, from childhood, that I would spend my life developing my intellect for my personal satisfaction and some form of service to the world. The assumption that I am completely able to balance reason with emotion, empathy with self-care. The gift of the responsibility to become an adult.

2. The friendship of a number of delightful men with whom I can fraternize freely without fear or shame and speak with the freedom that can only be between equals.

3. The ability to realize, some four years after the fact, that the responsibility to prevent my ex from coercing and humiliating me had in fact been his. (Hey, I'm a little slow sometimes.) The knowledge that I need never again accept such treatment as fitting, and that the law will never compell me to. The ability to discover rank festering swamps of anger hidden beneath layers of guilt, and to begin to drain them.

4. A feminist boyfriend who flatly refused to play by the rules I'd learned and helped me to discover the security, freedom, and joy that intimacy can bring. The fact that I am bound to him only by my deep love for him.

5. The undisputed right to strike off alone for long hours into the woods or through the city, to have spontaneous adventures, to build physical strength, to devote time to all manner of indelicate hobbies, to hop around the living room on one foot for no apparent reason, and to do it all in comfortable clothes.

Man, I already have five more in mind. But those will do for a start.

[Kathryn]

Feminism is simply the belief that women are people, and that any belief system that downgrades them should be rejected. I am a Christian feminist because I believe that the above statement is consistent with true Biblical Christianity. Yes, the Bible has been misused to hurt people, but that is what it is, misuse. "There is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither slave nor free; there is neither male nor female; ye are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:28)". Study the attitude of Jesus toward women and you'll see the truth of that verse borne out. I am so thankful I don't have to conform to anyone's idea of what my "role" is as a woman. Do I agree with all secular feminists on every issue? No. Abortion is murder (although you do save the life of the mother), and homosexual behavior is a sin. Why am I a feminist? Because it is right. For more on this issue, go to Christians For Biblical Equality at cbeinternational.org and look up Woman Be Free by Patricia Gundry. There are many great books there, also some wonderful discussion.

[Russian Girls]

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