Chrystal Eastman's Essay Now We Can Begin

The word freedom means to be free. Not to have restraint, but to have liberty. Chrystal Eastman wrote an essay called “Now We Can Begin.” Now was this essay successful? Look at where women in America are at today. They have the right to vote, the right to their own body, and even the right to choose their own occupation aside from a man. This essay was a success. She made an exemplary argument about women’s freedom regarding the rights to their own body, freedom of occupation, and independence from a man. First and foremost, should women have the right to decide what they do with their own body? In Eastman’s essay, she talks about a woman’s right to birth control. She uses an emotional appeal to inspire her readers on why women should have …show more content…
The woman’s suffrage amendment gave women the right to vote in America but not freedom of independence. Eastman’s essay accurately describes men as how they truly are and women as a more valuable object than as to how they are treated. “Two business women can “make a home” together without either one being over-burdened or over-bored. It is because they both know how and both feel responsible. But it is a rare man who can marry one of them and continue the homemaking partnership” (Eastman, “Now We Can Begin”). Again, Pathos are used here to show the emotional effect on women that do not have independence from men. In this essay the use of pathos hooks the reader in. The emotional connection that Eastman makes with her readers regarding women is what makes this piece of art successful. At the end of her essay she states that “there is no reason why woman should not become almost a human thing.” Eastman flourished in her attempt to provide the reader with reasons supporting her claims that women should have the rights to her own body, freedom of occupation, and independence from a man. In the end, this essay proved to mankind that speaking up about issues that one may have could potentially change the