Speaker 1: Brought to you by the Reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to step Mom? Never Told You?
Speaker 1: From how Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: This is Molly. I'm Kristen and if all goes according
Speaker 1: to plan. Our last podcast dealt with feminism and how
Speaker 1: feminism is kind of a confusing topic these days. No
Speaker 1: one really knows what a feminist looks like, what feminists
Speaker 1: stand for, and today we're going to kind of go
Speaker 1: into the history of feminism to kind of explain how
Speaker 1: things got so confusing. And the last podcast, right, we
Speaker 1: focus a lot on what it is today. So we're
Speaker 1: going to go back to one of the first movements
Speaker 1: that probably comes to mind when you think about feminism,
Speaker 1: and that is the suffrage movement um when women American
Speaker 1: women campaigned to get the vote. And the suffrage movement
Speaker 1: was born out of antislavery and temporary movements of the
Speaker 1: time because women were barred from participating in a lot
Speaker 1: of the social organizations that were pushing for the abolition
Speaker 1: of slavery and temperance. In in eighteen forty, Elizabeth Katie
Speaker 1: Stanton and Lucretia Mott tried to go to the World
Speaker 1: Antislavery Convention in London, but the men who were running
Speaker 1: the event so that they couldn't participate because they were women,
Speaker 1: and that that got them angry. It got them angry,
Speaker 1: and you know, this was one of the first time
Speaker 1: women kind of got angry about that. At the time,
Speaker 1: women had very little control of our lives. They're having
Speaker 1: seven children, they weren't going to college or university, and
Speaker 1: so the abolition movement really had provided the first chance
Speaker 1: to kind of get out of the home. And when
Speaker 1: they were rejected from that as well, they had to
Speaker 1: do something about it. So Elizabeth Katie stand and Lucresia
Speaker 1: Mott organized the Seneca Falls Convention, right, and at the
Speaker 1: Seneca Falls Convention, uh, they penned the Declaration of Sentiments,
Speaker 1: and this is the first document outlining the need for
Speaker 1: equality among women and women in the United States, including
Speaker 1: voting rights. And from there the suffrage movement really starts
Speaker 1: to take shape. But we should know that these are
Speaker 1: jazz movements. They are taking place in the United States.
Speaker 1: You know, these were sort of the first actions in
Speaker 1: the United States that could be considered feminism, but the
Speaker 1: idea of feminism is actually borrowed from Europe and France.
Speaker 1: The idea of male and female equality really took shape
Speaker 1: during the French Revolution, and from there we borrow the
Speaker 1: term feminism, which came to the United Station was in
Speaker 1: use by around nineteen ten, but not all suffragets would
Speaker 1: actually label themselves feminism because at the time there are
Speaker 1: two distinct things. Suffragettes or fighting specifically for the right
Speaker 1: to vote, no more, no less, whereas feminism included equal
Speaker 1: right across the board, financial independence, and transforming the relationship
Speaker 1: between the sexes. It was a far more revolutionary idea.
Speaker 1: So that's the idea that kind of from what I understand,
Speaker 1: Kristen goes dormant after women get the right to vote,
Speaker 1: and kind of stays dormant until the nineteen sixties, right,
Speaker 1: because you have uh splintering among groups of suffragettes who
Speaker 1: aren't comfortable with fighting for more feminist agendas, if you will.
Speaker 1: And it wasn't really until after World War Two with
Speaker 1: the Women's Liberation movement that you have the next large
Speaker 1: scale organized feminist movement. Not to say that during the
Speaker 1: World Wars women weren't doing a lot of things. You know,
Speaker 1: we have women since the g i s were off fighting,
Speaker 1: a lot of women were leaving the home and working
Speaker 1: in larger numbers than ever before. Educational opportunities were opening
Speaker 1: up for women. Um. And that all lead up to
Speaker 1: the nineteen sixties and the women's lib movement. Rosie the Riveter,
Speaker 1: Yes brings us to the nineteen sixties and our next movement,
Speaker 1: women's liberation movement. And the issues at this time are
Speaker 1: basically domesticity, employment, education, and sexuality right right. Because after
Speaker 1: World War Two, all the men came home from war
Speaker 1: and it was a revival of the cult of domesticity.
Speaker 1: You have the rise of household consumerism and all these
Speaker 1: highly educated women who were feeling trapped at home. So
Speaker 1: what we have out of that feeling of being trapped?
Speaker 1: There was a very prominent book we discussed in the
Speaker 1: Labs podcast, the Feminine Mystique, and the author Betty for
Speaker 1: Dan and other prominent feminists comes together to form the
Speaker 1: National Organization for Women Are Now And this is probably
Speaker 1: one of the most famous feminist organizations. And this was
Speaker 1: this was comprised largely of older, college educated, predominantly white women.
Speaker 1: There were some some men involved in it as well, UM,
Speaker 1: but it really it seemed like in the beginning it
Speaker 1: really catered to middle and upperclass women, right, and they
Speaker 1: were pushing for access to the birth control pill, abortion rights,
Speaker 1: equal employment opportunity, reduction of domestic violence. And they start
Speaker 1: out holding feminist conferences. It's sort of, I guess, probably
Speaker 1: what we all think of as the glory days of feminism.
Speaker 1: And while all of us is going on, younger people
Speaker 1: are also getting energized because of the civil rights movement
Speaker 1: and more radical protests against the Vietnam War. And it's
Speaker 1: among this younger set of feminists that you have uh
Speaker 1: more radical splinter groups there aren't necessarily associated with the
Speaker 1: National Organization for Women, who are protesting more more in
Speaker 1: your face about women's rights and uh sexual freedom and
Speaker 1: all of that. And one of the most prominent events
Speaker 1: associated with that is the protests by the New York
Speaker 1: Radical Women against the nineteen sixty eight Miss American paget
Speaker 1: And this is really where the idea of feminists being
Speaker 1: bra burners comes to life. Yeah, so this is a
Speaker 1: really interesting story. It's Miss America pageant and along the
Speaker 1: Atlantic City Boardwalk, the New York Radical Women's Organization, you know,
Speaker 1: throws this big protest where you throw everything that represents
Speaker 1: submissive females into a bucket. So we got bras that,
Speaker 1: I think, kitchen utensil, layboy, all sorts of things that
Speaker 1: just you know, spell out the fact that women have
Speaker 1: been enslaved by men, to use a radical word, right,
Speaker 1: And they were they were planning to light this on
Speaker 1: fire as as a symbol of them getting rid of
Speaker 1: all these um all these things that we're holding them back.
Speaker 1: But the Atlantic City police weren't too keen on a
Speaker 1: giant fire on the boardwalk, so they never ended up
Speaker 1: doing it, and not a single bra was burned that day.
Speaker 1: But somehow the media got a word of what was
Speaker 1: going on, and the next day it was a feminists
Speaker 1: or bra burners are taking off their braws, they're burning
Speaker 1: them and it never never happened, never happened. Equal rights
Speaker 1: never rose like a phoenix from the ashes of burning bras. Uh.
Speaker 1: But this is just the first of many splinter groups
Speaker 1: that come out of this nineteen sixties nineteen seventies movement. Now,
Speaker 1: as we've mentioned, Molly Uh National Organization for Roman was
Speaker 1: focused a lot on these older, college educated, predominantly white
Speaker 1: women and black feminists. At the time, some of them
Speaker 1: felt marginalized by this movement because they felt like the
Speaker 1: the issues that white feminists were focusing on didn't take
Speaker 1: into account working class and minority women. And you have
Speaker 1: to remember that at the same time, you've got the
Speaker 1: civil rights movement and the Black power movement going on
Speaker 1: as well, and I think a lot of black women
Speaker 1: at the time I felt very conflicted about where they
Speaker 1: should place their allegiance because it's either you know, you
Speaker 1: have more male lead Black power movement, then you've got
Speaker 1: white female lead women's lib movement. What do you do?
Speaker 1: And so out of that comes black feminism, right. And
Speaker 1: I think an interesting thing that came to around the
Speaker 1: same time was this idea of womanism. I think we
Speaker 1: mentioned this in the last podcast as a term coined
Speaker 1: by Alice Walker, who wrote The Color Purple, and it
Speaker 1: was to sort of um bridge the gap between white
Speaker 1: feminism and black feminism, where we could all just be
Speaker 1: women in this society, look at the problem holistically instead
Speaker 1: of just looking at things that are unique to separate parts,
Speaker 1: not seeing the forest for the trees, right. And I think,
Speaker 1: as we also mentioned the last podcast, black and white
Speaker 1: feminists did work together on a on a lot of
Speaker 1: different feminist issues, but it was through Black feminism that
Speaker 1: you have the rise of organizations such as the National
Speaker 1: Black Feminist Organization and the National Alliance of Black Feminists
Speaker 1: that really focused on what feminism means for Black women
Speaker 1: and the issues surrounding them. So, as we just mentioned
Speaker 1: one of the things that got thrown into those big buckets,
Speaker 1: they want to go on fire in Atlantic City where
Speaker 1: Playboy magazines, and that kind of leads us into the next,
Speaker 1: uh sort of movement in feminism. Right, Molly is referring
Speaker 1: to the feminist sex wars, and one of the platforms
Speaker 1: of second wave feminism was combating sexual violence and anti
Speaker 1: porn feminism that arose in the late nineteen seventies perceived
Speaker 1: pornography as a form of sexual violence against women. One
Speaker 1: of the quotes from anti porn feminist Robin Morgan was,
Speaker 1: pornography is the theory, rape is the practice. And so
Speaker 1: anti porn feminists wanted to outlaw all pornography because they
Speaker 1: felt like it was a violation on women's bodies. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and they really just saw all sex, all head her
Speaker 1: sexual intercourse as a former male domination. Uh, it must
Speaker 1: be totally altered in a way that it's not harmful
Speaker 1: to women. And you know, that's one thing, but that
Speaker 1: sort of uh didn't sit well with everyone, especially women
Speaker 1: who thought that what feminism should stand for be equal
Speaker 1: rights in an act such as sex. It wasn't about
Speaker 1: um outlawing sex just because you know, the man might enjoy.
Speaker 1: It was about making sexual freedom and sexual pleasure available
Speaker 1: to also. In responds to the anti porn feminist, you've
Speaker 1: got the sex positive feminist or pro sex feminism that
Speaker 1: kind of comes out of this movement in the nineteen
Speaker 1: late nineteen seventies to dominate the early nineteen eighties, and
Speaker 1: among these feminists you have people such as Betty Dodson
Speaker 1: and Gil Reuben who really wanted to reclaim sexual intercourse
Speaker 1: as something that a woman could enjoy. And today sex
Speaker 1: positive feminism has evolved outside of the bedroom um to
Speaker 1: include also the sex industry, including porn and prostitution. Right,
Speaker 1: sex positive feminists would just say that prostitutes are earning
Speaker 1: a living, that it's there's nothing wrong with that. They're
Speaker 1: not being degraded. It was their choice. That would be
Speaker 1: sort of how a pro sex feminist would view that choice.
Speaker 1: And they can take it as a form of personal
Speaker 1: empowerment because they are financially supporting themselves exactly. Now, the
Speaker 1: last sort of evolution of feminism are going to talk
Speaker 1: about only brings us up to the early nineties, but
Speaker 1: it's probably one of the um, you know, most famous
Speaker 1: movements come out recently, and that's the Riot Girls. This
Speaker 1: was happening in specifically in Olympia Washington and Washington Washington,
Speaker 1: d C. And grew out from that. And in the
Speaker 1: early nineties, you have the daughters of second wave feminists
Speaker 1: who might be feeling a little loss their their mother's
Speaker 1: brand of feminism might not be seeming quite as relevant
Speaker 1: to them because now, you the pill has been around
Speaker 1: for a while, Roe V. Wade has been around for
Speaker 1: a while. Um, but you still have a lot of
Speaker 1: issues such as rape and sexual violence that are still
Speaker 1: affecting women's lives. So what do you do with it?
Speaker 1: So what these women do, these daughters of the second
Speaker 1: way feminists, They find a way to blend together music, art,
Speaker 1: and consciousness, raising into sort of a unique brand of feminism.
Speaker 1: They take to these male dominated music scenes where all
Speaker 1: these you know, bands are fronted by male front guys
Speaker 1: and start forming their own bands and publicizing themselves and
Speaker 1: their ideas with these homemade magazines called zines and in
Speaker 1: essence all their communicators to sort of do it yourself
Speaker 1: punk rock values that encompass what they consider the new
Speaker 1: feminist ideas. Right, Riot Girls was very grassroots. Um. Two
Speaker 1: of the bands that really helped promote the Riot Girl
Speaker 1: movement were Bikini Kill and Bratt Mobile. And it was
Speaker 1: actually Alison Wolfe and Molly Numa, who were the front
Speaker 1: leaders of Bratt Mobile, who started the zine called Riot
Speaker 1: Girl that the movement borrowed from. And it's very gritty,
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's do it yourself, but that what
Speaker 1: they were doing was facilitating these weekly meetings to discuss
Speaker 1: what they thought were the issues such as rape, racism,
Speaker 1: and body image. Um. They wanted to talk about sexuality
Speaker 1: very frankly and you know, reclaim these negative stereotype about
Speaker 1: who owns a woman's body. And an interesting thing about
Speaker 1: Riot Girls is that they never wanted it to become
Speaker 1: a mainstream movement like Women's Libo. When national news outlets
Speaker 1: picked up on the trend and started writing huge cover
Speaker 1: stories on it, the Riot Girls declared a media blackout
Speaker 1: because they didn't want to dilute the effect of this
Speaker 1: this pretty powerful grassroots movement. Right. So yeah, that brings
Speaker 1: us up to today, right, So where are we today? Um?
Speaker 1: Before we came, Kristen was showing me with her savvy
Speaker 1: web skills all the places that feminism can be found online,
Speaker 1: which is really kind of where you know, like most things,
Speaker 1: the movement has moved. I would say that the blog
Speaker 1: community is really one of the primary places for feminist
Speaker 1: communities right now. You've got blogs such as feminist ng
Speaker 1: and broadsheet on salon Um that are really powerful forums
Speaker 1: for for feminists today to talk about pertinent issues. I
Speaker 1: think one of the problems with the web is because
Speaker 1: you know, everyone has access to it and everyone can
Speaker 1: sort of put their own brand of feminism up. That's
Speaker 1: sort of what leads to confusion about what the term means,
Speaker 1: which is what we were discussing last time. So that
Speaker 1: can need to be a good thing or a bad thing,
Speaker 1: depending on how you look at it. You know, if
Speaker 1: you've got a keyboard and an Internet connection, you can
Speaker 1: put your own brand of what feminism means to you
Speaker 1: on the web. And on the flip side of that,
Speaker 1: one of the debates that's been raging i'd say in
Speaker 1: the past few years is whether or not uh, feminism
Speaker 1: really exists anymore, and whether or not it's even a
Speaker 1: useful term. So yeah, because as you can just tell
Speaker 1: from today, we had about five moments, none of which
Speaker 1: really subscribed to the same theories or ideas. Right. But
Speaker 1: I will tell you, Molly, I was on I was
Speaker 1: scrolling through feminist NG today before we started recording, and
Speaker 1: I just noticed that the resounding theme I think of
Speaker 1: all the conversations with feminists today, and I think that
Speaker 1: it will always be this way is the idea of choice. Um,
Speaker 1: even though women might take different perspectives on it and
Speaker 1: want to tackle choice from different angles, at end of
Speaker 1: the day, I think that's what feminism is really all about.
Speaker 1: Whether that's choice dealing with the pill, or abortion, or
Speaker 1: sexual violence or workplace equality, all of that has to
Speaker 1: do with the single issue of choice. Okay, that's a
Speaker 1: good note to end on. So if you want to
Speaker 1: learn more about feminism, you can exercise your choice to
Speaker 1: go read How Feminism Works and also Top five Feminist Movements,
Speaker 1: both articles written by a very on Kristen Uh. They're
Speaker 1: all at how stuff works dot com And if you
Speaker 1: have a question or comment for Kristen and me, just
Speaker 1: email us at mom stuff at how stuff works dot
Speaker 1: com for moralness and thousands of other topics. Because it
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