Sometimes, when looking at people who choose not to understand what feminism means, the response “women already got the vote, what else do we need?” This is a plain indicator that the person speaking has absolutely no idea what the goals are of the third-wave of feminism. First wave feminism focused on the voting rights, property rights, and influence within the family and society. For the beginning of feminism, these were direct and well-liked goals. According to the in-class textbook, In Their Time, first-wave feminism’s “participants were largely white and middle-class, their goals reflected their desire for self-fulfillment and for greater influence in both family and in public life.” (LeGates 198). It is easy now for everybody to understand what feminism meant back then; …show more content…
Some were so firm in their belief of emancipation while others were not, leading to group factions, and the inevitable crumbling of the entire group. The second-wave of feminism, starting in the 1960s, was more convoluted and inclusive than the first wave. There was more of a focus on women’s sexuality, workplace rights, and reproductive rights. There was also the increased focus on the Equal Rights Amendment. There was staunch opposition to the second-wave of feminism, possibly because it was more aggressive in it’s campaign and in it’s goals. A favorite opposing quote directed at the second-wave says; "The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians."(Pat Robertson) This is a lot to do in one lifetime, and any historian will tell you that capitalism, however shaky, is here to stay for a while and can take a beating. I would venture to argue that second-wave feminists, such as Gloria Steinem or Dorothy Pitman-Hughes would not have recognized first-wave feminism as feminism at all. Sure, they were winning the vote, but it was such a predominately ethnocentric movement, that is barely fits today’s definition of feminism, let alone the second-wave. Betty Friedan, a feminist