Olympe De Gouges: Declaration Of The Rights Of Man

The French Revolution is ultimately due to a new age of thinking, called the Enlightenment. Kant spoke of the Enlightenment as a way of thinking and deciding for oneself and without the help of others. Most people do not think for themselves and let others actually think and decide for them; however, Kant stated that as a society it would be easiest to change people’s minds and allow for teach individual to think for themselves. Now this process is slow and one of the biggest barriers to this process is often a monarch. Kant states that some monarchs may be enlightened, but most do not want his subjects to be free-thinking citizens. This is where the root of the unrest during the French Revolution is rooted in. The French subjects wanted to be able to make their own decisions and to be free-thinking humans; however, the monarch set laws that made free-thinking harder.
Following the ideas of the Enlightenment, the Frenchmen wrote the “Declaration of the …show more content…
Revolution is a time of change and women wanted their lives and their rights to improve along with the men’s. However, without De Gouges’ Declaration there would have been no one speaking for women. Her declaration state almost identical rights for women as the “Declaration of the rights of Man” states for men. De Gouges wanted equal treatment and equal punishment, which was not provided to them before. Before the revolution, women were given almost no rights when it came to terms of custody or legal matters. De Gouges wanted that to change for women and for them to receive more rights and to become more important figures in society. Her Declaration is even addressed to the Queen of France as a way to grab the attention of the monarchs and initiate change. However, that did not happen and also lead to civil unrest in