Women's Liberation Movement In The 1960s

Throughout history women have constantly had fewer constitutional rights and profession openings than men, primarily because women have continuously been considered inferior to men. The working class also possessed fewer rights during the 1800s. Workers were bound to their employers and had little to no rights. As the years moved on, much of that began to change. Employed citizens had little to no voting rights, and they kept trying until they achieved what they wanted.

Oregon-Doc. 7). The only job that women needed was motherhood because they were labeled as the idol to their children. According to this women had little independence and were diversified form men. Proper to the stereotype of women, in 1908 the Supreme Court accepted the political constitution of law to protecting women labor and the discrimination of both gender. Women were bias to the stereotype of gender roles and their rights and independence.

Interpreting the message of sexism in Their Eyes Were Watching God. Janie is now with another man named Joe Starks (Jody by the nickname Janie gave him) was a man in high wealth. Janie was not able to have the freedom she wanted with this man. Whatever he did she would have no say; Janie continued to keep silent regardless of what happened in their marriage, “No matter what Jody did, she said nothing. She had learned how to talk some and leave some.

Women still faced inequality and discrimination, but in the words of the Virginia Slim’s slogan, which was marketed toward women in the sixties and seventies, “You’ve come a long way, baby!” (Catalano, pg. 76). The simple fact that product marketing, which was not for household products, food, or clothing, was being directed toward women was evidence of a new group of people with purchasing power. Women were no longer sitting idly by as decisions were being made for them. They were out in the working world, the political world, and the commerce world, making things happen and being counted

The event that really kick started the movement was in 1903 when Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughter founded the Women’s Social and Political Union, also known as the WSPU (“The Women’s Suffrage Movement”). With this, many other groups started to form and branched out throughout the whole country. At this time women in America were going against ‘The Cult of True Womanhood’, which was the idea that you were a “true” woman only if you were a helpful wife, did chores around the house and other family related things (“The Fight for Women’s Suffrage”). Lastly, with different groups forming and women going against ‘The Cult of True Womanhood’, it put together a new outlook of what it meant to be a woman in the United

1920’s: Women’s Suffrage Alice Paul once said; “There will never be a new world order until woman are part of it.” In this quote the women’s right leader refers to how women are important to society. Society need women because of their capacity in a smartest way to take decisions.

The issue of women’s rights and how different societies and cultures deal with it had been on the table for many centuries. In the United States of America during the 1800s, women began to move toward and demand getting equal rights as men, they decided to speak up and fight for their stolen rights. In the 1960s, continued working toward their goal, women broadened their activities through the women’s rights movement which aimed to help them in gaining their right to receive education, occupy the same jobs that were once titled only for men, and get an access to leadership positions. The women’s rights movement has a great impact on women today, although it started a long time ago, but it did not stop and women are reaping their fruit today,

Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s contribution to this cause was monumental to the start of this movement. They, along with plenty of other women and rights activists, fought for equality for women in society. Not having the right to vote made women feel as if their opinions and political views were trivial and not equal to those of men. However, men felt as if women were too emotional, less educated, and were unable to evaluate political issues that did not pertain to a group consisting of mostly stay at home mothers. Obviously, as history has now demonstrated, exactly the opposite is true.

The Reconstruction Era occurred in 1865, it was was a period after the Civil War in which America was focused on rebuilding the broken South. In 1867, the Radical reconstruction gave former slaves a voice in government. During this era, formers slaves gained a platform in the government, with some blacks as Congressmen. However, not everyone supported the idea of Reconstruction. Less than a decade after the Reconstruction period, a small group composed of democratic ex-confederate veterans, white farmers and white southerners sympathetic to white supremacy joined forces together to form the Ku Klux Klan.

“Women are coaxed, flattered, courted, but they are not respected by many men as they out to be; neither do they respect themselves as they should” (Horace Greeley ”Women’s Rights”). After the Revolutionary War women’s rights did not see a dramatic change. Some states allowed women to vote while others did not. With the adoption of the Bill of Rights, these amendments only attain to white males only. It wasn’t until the mid-1800 that Elizabeth Stanton began to lead for women right movements. In 1848 “three hundred men and women attend the convention in the Wesleyan Methodist chapel; of those one hundred signed the Declaration of Rights and Sentiments” (Alison Parker, The Seneca Falls Convention).

Women said that they needed power and wanted to make their own decisions. Men completely disagreed. “To their frustration, women found, just as female activists had a century earlier, that the men in these social reform movements were reluctant to give women any substantial

The years leading up to the movement were very difficult for women. Women were considered weaker than men, therefore they were not treated equally. Women at this time were made totally dependant on men, and they had very few rights in their lives. Some examples of their hardships include: they were not allowed to vote, married women had no property rights, they were unable to be fully educated, etc.

Though it was frowned for a woman to act, think, write, and speak like men, that didn’t stop them. In the book, Revolutionary Mothers by Carol Berkin, we learned that women were prohibited to exercise anything out of field and house work, especially politics, this book demonstrates that over the decades, women had altered that perception.

“War will exact its victims of both sexes,” Belle Boyd mused, “and claims the hearts of women no less than the bodies of men.” When the United States had gone to war for World War II, women were left in charge of the household since the men had to leave the country. As men were fighting in World War II, women had taken over the workforce in company factories or organizations. This was a big step for women because they finally got to experience what being independent felt like. However, although many women liked the workforce department other women wanted to do more for their country.

As Ruth Rosen explains throughout her book, The World Split Open, the Women’s Rights Movement certainly resulted in significant changes in the way Americans perceived the woman’s role in a variety of situations. From home to academia to politics, the women’s movement helped to make the changes necessary so that women would be respected and treated as equals in any field they chose to pursue. Of the changes that stemmed from the movement in the 1970s, the unity and collaboration that exists among women is one of the most historically significant because of the way it influenced so many women from vastly different lifestyles. To begin, Rosen often discussed the “nameless” problems that plagued women throughout the 1950s and into the 60s. Too often, millions of