Am I A Feminist?
Before studying feminism I didn’t have much of a refined definition of what feminism was. Most likely, I would have defined feminism as a movement of women being overly vocal about their views, and what their rights should be. Today’s society has given feminism a bad rap, and I am one of those people who hadn’t done enough research on my own to learn the history of feminism. Sadly, I have never been passionate about feminism, I just knew about it from the protests I’ve seen, and the very vocal posts on social media. After viewing many videos and readings, I have a much better grasp on what feminism is, and what my personal views are.
(Here is a video that is light hearted, but also very true. Laci Green, does a great job of explaining feminism in a very understandable way. Click here.)
I would indeed identify myself as a feminist. It’s clear to me, that I personally believe that the future of women, and their equality to men lies in the hands of the state and federal government. Yes, we must bring awareness to feminism, and speak about it, but protests and obnoxious social media posts are not going to create equal pay, and or equality in the sense of gender and the different gender roles. After taking my personality test based on the feminist perspective scale, I was not shocked at my results, but I was excited to learn more.
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The reaction I had to my results was pretty good. I was proud of how well I knew myself, and guessed what my results would be. My top result was “Woman of Color” with a score of 46, with the highest possible being 50. Prior to this personality test, I had learned a lot about intersectionality. Intersectionality, is the idea of realizing that all categories (race, gender, class, etc.) all overlap. In Crawford's textbook this is understood when Crawford speaks about feminist psychologists: "Feminist Psychologists try to understand not only the effects of gender, but also the effects of other systems of social classification such as race, social class, and sexual orientation" (Crawford, 2011, p.18).
Black feminism believes that all of the “isms” are intertwined, and work in sync with one another. Sounds like something we just talked about, doesn't it? This was spot on with me, because I am a firm believer in intersectionality and that racism and sexism cannot exist without one another. Identifying as a black feminist is totally okay with me. Understanding that being black and being a female cannot be viewed separately when thinking about black women. I don’t believe though that being a black feminist causes a divide in the sexes. White women do indeed have a greater privilege than black women so for that matter I find nothing wrong with the term black feminist. I find it sad that I had never heard of the term, and I’m sad that more awareness hasn’t been brought to the black feminist movement.
At first glance, seeing the term “liberal feminist” as second on my list was a little alarming. Mostly because the term liberal often has a negative connotation or you assume they are aggressive or have views that are very set in stone. After reading more, I would have to say that I could in fact identify as a liberal feminist. The thing I agree with the most is that liberal feminist believe firmly in the political and governmental side of feminism being the most important in bringing change to gender inequality.
A few other questions I have about feminism may be “who opposes
feminism, and why?” I am very curious to hear the other side of feminism. There
are obviously people who oppose it, and actually hate it, but I want to learn
from them, and have a very well rounded view on feminism, I want to know all
sides, and learn enough to be able to have an intellectual conversation or
debate on the idea of feminism, along with the feminist movement.
Perspective
|
Score
|
46
|
|
33
|
|
28
|
|
25
|
|
23
|
|
Conservative
|
18
|
References
Are You a Feminist. (2015, March 15). Retrieved July 14, 2017, from
https://i2.wp.com/www.adweek.com/files/imagecache/node-blog/blogs/are-you-a-
feminist-hed-2013.jpg
https://i2.wp.com/www.adweek.com/files/imagecache/node-blog/blogs/are-you-a-
feminist-hed-2013.jpg
Marshall, Katie. "Sparking a Gender Debate." Chicks and Mortar. N.p., 05 Nov. 2016. Web.
16 July 2017.
THE F-WORD. (2014, July 08). Retrieved July 2, 2017, from https://youtu.be/EJPT_U97lNs
Why Your Feminism Isn't True Feminism Unless It's Intersectional. (2016, August 22). Retrieved
August 16, 2017, from https://www.theodysseyonline.com/why-your-feminism-isnt-true-
feminism-unless-its-intersectional
16 July 2017.
THE F-WORD. (2014, July 08). Retrieved July 2, 2017, from https://youtu.be/EJPT_U97lNs
Why Your Feminism Isn't True Feminism Unless It's Intersectional. (2016, August 22). Retrieved
August 16, 2017, from https://www.theodysseyonline.com/why-your-feminism-isnt-true-
feminism-unless-its-intersectional
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