The Fourth Wave of Feminism and What it Would Look Like

I decided to change my thesis statement a little bit as to look and search that if there was to be a fourth wave of feminism, what it would look like and what would it involve. This topic interests me because after reading the last readings all three of the waves pretty much discussed the same thing. Equality for women, but it seemed to me that the vision lost its focus. How can men and women be equal to each other? Clearly you can see men are built bigger and stronger than women (now a day’s …well I think the steroids that are fed to cows and the chemicals that are sprayed on the plants may have a bit to do with the shift) even if you have one that works out, a woman cannot get as big as a man can. (I am talking the majority of men not all), our brains our bodies function differently, so I ask again, what was this fight all about? I believe that for five decades feminism was fighting a losing battle. I am however still searching for the discovery of when did the awareness begin for domestic violence. I think I found it but am still researching more to confirm my conclusion. However the most exciting part about this paper is the revision of the Good Wife’s Guide…not so much a revision. I couldn’t decide on how to revise it so I went into a totally other direction. I think you will be interested in how it turns out. My discovery on the Fourth Wave of Feminism is that men and women can co-exist. It’s all about compromise, and making each other happy, not being on separate teams but the same team. After all isn’t it apart of the same family? I am very excited about this paper, it is probably the first paper and project that I really got into and had fun with. It allowed me to really see for myself, where it all went wrong. I got a lot of insight on the fact that feminism has been a waste of time, because it lost what women are all about, and I also discovered why men have been acting the way they have. Through a feminist movement we lost our femininity. We are no longer women, when we are fighting to be equal to men. To be equal to men, you are asking to be treated like one of the boys. When the men do that we get mad because we aren’t respected, so it isn’t equality that we are looking for it is appreciation, and respect that we hunger after. Admiration and gratefulness of what we do on a daily basis, and how much we accomplish in spite of everything going on around us. To be looked at as a household administrator and not just a housekeeper. That in order for the man’s world to be in order, the woman has to be in order. We are the glue that holds everything together. It’s a shame to recognize this now, but a true feminist movement is the ability to maintain our femininity and recognition at the same time. That isn’t too much to ask for. To eliminate all stereotypes of what a feminist looks like, because she could be the one sitting right next to you and you wouldn’t even know it.

White, Milk, or Dark Chocolate? What Does it Matter...When I Have A Chocolate Craving I Just Want Some Chocolate!

I can remember when my youngest daughter, was old enough too distinct the difference between different hair textures, she would always say, “Mommy, I want white girls hair”, I would reply why, and she would then reply “because their hair is prettier and it sways back and forth”. Even at three years old, my daughter could tell that even hair texture of the white race girls were preferred over the texture of an African American girl. At three years old, how did she come to this? I never did ask her, what made her think that their hair was better that hers, and now she doesn’t even remember why she said that and what would make her say such a thing.
All the pieces read for today, tie into my theme for my final paper, and they really tie into each other as the issue that no matter what shapes our lips, texture our hair, the color of our skin, the size of our backside, or front side for that matter, we can never measure up. Not to societies expectations, but our own expectations. We set such high standards because it’s what we think society wants us to think. This has a lot to do with the advertisements of today’s products. Fashion, perfume, mouthwash, cars, alcohol, etc, everything sold now a day’s involves sex. It takes sex for everything; you have to be sexy to where perfume, drinking alcohol drives you to sex, you have to wear sexy clothes, and in order to do that you must be a certain size to be looked upon as being SEXY. But why does it take sex to sell everything? Take the Dove commercials, finally a product that has decided to put real women in the commercial. They’re not airbrushed, or tummy tucked. They have wrinkles, they are over the age of 50, and they are overweight. They are real women of the real world. There is nothing perfect about them, but they are happy to be who they are. Used to be a day that I worked so hard to lose weight and maintain a certain stature of how I looked. Why? Because I wanted to be attractive to other people, now the only reason why I work out is to be healthy and to live a long fulfilling life. If I lose weight along with being healthy then great, I have accomplished two things at one time. But to be healthy is the main and only reason. I like food too much and love to eat and have starved myself before in order to lose weight, but I wasn’t happy in life because I was hungry all the time.
As women we need to embrace our beauty as we see it and not how society sees it. We need to embrace and encourage other women on their beauty. When you see someone that doesn’t look like you or have features like you that are ok, because we were not created equally or simultaneously. We created to be special and different and that is what makes this world so interesting. I believe that I might have mentioned this before. If we all looked the same, then we would be stuck in the middle of the Avatar movie, blue with pointy ears and tails.

Where Did It All Begin? and How Did It Get To This Place

People call me a feminist, and with that comes all the stereotypes and stigmas with it. Even though none of those fit, and they have all the wrong pieces to this puzzle, I accept this title, as a new feminist leader, with great pride and honor, that could possibly change the focus of what the purpose of feminismtruly is all about. After all we are NOT all man haters or bashers, we are not all lesbians who at one time were heterosexual and crossed over to the other side because one man treated us bad. Where these stereotypes come from, are from those who have hatred in their heart towards a certain race, and/or group, and don't want to be alone in their hater world. I mean come on, who really wants to be the only person standing alone on a single issue? It is so much easier to rally against an entire group when you have someone whose got your back. However, when you rally for the wrong reasons, you create alts against those who may be able to help you. This brings me to my final project. When looking at the issue of domestic violence...when did all the protests and awareness begin. This is what I am searching for.

I want to find compare how feminism was in the 1950's to how feminism is in the present time. I will begin to research and find statistics on femenism back then, who was protesting and the activists in the past days. Who are the activists of the present time? When did the awareness begin and what caused society to advocate for those women who were being beaten? How did domestic violence switch from focusing on the physical abuse to being more aware on the emotional aspects of domestic violence? By doing this I will not only be able to make sense of this issue to myself, but to other women who don't understand why women stay in violent relationships whether it be physical or emotional. I will target all women of a community and I picture this turning into a women's conference, perhaps a women's luncheon. I want to allow all women to have a general over view that domestic violence is more than just men beating the crap out them and that it goes beyond the physical. That I could have a room of twenty women and only seven of those women would have endured physical abuse but that ALL of those women would have encountered the emotional trauma of domestic violence,; some have even suffered P.T.S.D. (post traumatic stress disorder). I am hoping that this will not only bring awareness to what true domestic violence is, but will bring all women together to advocate for one another. No matter what the situation, no matter what their class status, stature, race, gender, or ethnicity; that we as women can come together, and acknowledge our oppression that was forced upon us in the past times. Let us look at the African American race. No matter what, they stick together through out everything. The older generations help the younger generations understand their history of how they came to grow and become as one to fight for not only their freedom, but their integrity and dignity as human beings; because after all it all begins with the youth because they are our future advocates. That they were more than just slaves, that through all their trials and tribulations they made it through the tough times together. That all the fighting and all the riots never amount to anything but that their faith is what got them through. Now is racism completely vanished and disappeared? No, but we as society and Americans have come so far to eliminate racism and acknowledge that no matter what your race the only race that matters is the human race. I believe that we as women can come together and do the same. One status is not better than the other. What we need to do is help those who don't understand why certain women act, dress, and present themselves the way they do, and teach them to become women of virtue. Instead we cast them aside and let them figure out on their own, only to repeat the same insanity of making the same mistakes over and over again, and never getting anywhere. If one woman can reach thousands, imagine how many a billion can reach. Eventually we, as women, can come together and create awareness that we are more than just a housekeeper, a nanny, a taxi driver; that we can then come together as a community, men and women, to put an end to not only domestic violence but oppression.

Using the "Goodwife's Guide" as a guideline to creating a new updated version of the Goodwife's Guide of the new century. Since it was 1950 that it was originally written, I think that it is finally time to revise and create one that is politically correct for this day and age. One that will satisfy all walks of human life. It may not create totally and complete unification, there will always be someone who will go outside of the boundaries to create havoc, but at least we can attempt to create awareness and an environment for women to come together and become one accord.

Global Feminism??? Is It Even Possible When We Won't Even Help Our Own???

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Malawi: The Mind Set of Oppression Needs to Be Transformed to the Mind Set of Possession.

Malawi, which is found in the southeastern part of Africa, is a country that suffers from a number of different lacks; lack of fuel, food, medical supplies to help with the growing number of HIV/AIDS victims, discrimination, gender issues, and even political issues. You wouldn’t think that a third world country such as Malawi would have political issues but yes they do.

Members of the Democratic Progressive Party (DDP) and members of the Malawi Congress Party (MCP) are what make up the government in Malawi. There was a comment about the DDP wanting to change the Constitution to be able the give the sitting President more power, however others in parliament fear that this will give the President too much power. This, to me, is no different that the President of the United States of America. Our President really doesn’t have too much of a say so in much of anything. He can have some really good ideas on how to save the nation and help it grow, however if someone in Congress feels that a particular decision will not benefit them, they can go ahead and knock it down. (http://www.africamission-mafr.org/kanengonov09.htm).

When we look at the economy of Malawi, fuel is one of the highest scarcest commodities. It got so bad that President Bingu wa Mutharika , called a halt on any international travel (including himself) to protect the supply of fuel (Malawi Press Review, Nov 2009). Along with the fuel there is also a shortage of water, electricity, and soft drinks. (http://www.africamission-mafr.org/kanengonov09.htm)

To enhance the food source, there was a Greenbelt Bill that was passed. This was done in order to boost food supply and combat hunger (http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5i6kqhaPrKXKssw2MoJEbjyFGreTw).

Hiv/Aids are another still growing epidemic in Malawi. A woman by the name of Dr. Mary Shaba, who is the Principle Secretary for Nutrition and Hiv/Aids, “the fight against Hiv/Aids will not be completed if the country ignores the fact that there are gays in Malawi”. How can this issue be ignored or the fact that there are gays in Malawi? Not discriminating against the homosexual community, and by no means am I blaming the GLB community for the spreading of Hiv/Aids, however if they have statistical evidence that this is how it started then why not admit to the obvious, advocate for the people, and create an awareness to help stop the rapidly growing disease. Instead put a band aid on it, and wait for the adhesive to give out until the wound is gushing out all over the place. Aids is not just a homosexual disease, it affects all walks of life, but instead of taking care of the issue at its earliest moment when we can slow down the process wait until it grows out of control, or better yet, wait until it affects your immediately family and then watch how fast government is quick to jump up and make things happen. (http://www.africamission-mafr.org/kanengonov09.htm)

Last but definitely not least let’s talk about the gender issues and human trafficking that goes on. Women are still looked down upon as “no voice”. Amazing that a country that has yet to meet the 30% rate of females who are allowed in the decision making, is being praised still the this day for their efforts of the empowerment of women. Human trafficking is among the children; in fact they are not even allowed to go to school. They work on a farm and even the owner s of the farm rape these children. How does this tie into gender issues that goes on in Malawi? It is because of the female children that are targeted in human trafficking. (http://www.africamission-mafr.org/kanengonov09.htm)

These are the very issues that were discussed in the “Notebook” the story about Malawi. I guess I could consider myself blessed? That I don’t have endure what these women and children must go through in Malawi, but if you look at the big picture the only difference is that the United States has more money, we still are faced with the possibility of our children being taken away and sold for sex, poverty runs our streets, and all of us are just a paycheck away from going hungry, or getting the lights cut off. We the similar issues that the people of Malawi face, our country just have more money….even though we may never see it.

If You Cut Me Do I Not Bleed Red? If I Cut You Do You Not Bleed? So What Makes You Better Than Me?

Back in 1992, Sir Mix-A-Lot (a famous rapper), came out with a song, "baby got back", which emphasized on the size of the butt of the African American women. In the beginning of the video are two white teenage girls commenting on a black woman standing there who has a largely proportionate backside. They even went as far as to call her a prostitute, since she was wearing a dress that fit rather tightly. In the song baby got back, as Sir Mix-A-Lot is complimenting the fact that black women have large butts and that is what black men prefer, a comment is made that "even white boys gotta shout", stating that it is a sexual desire to black men for "their" women to have large backsides, that she is so attractive that a white man has to agree. I thought, for a minute, that this was just a craze that had started in the 1990's, until I read the piece on Sarah Baartman. What I have to wonder is why was she picked out when it stated, "Baartman's physical characteristics, not unusual for Khoisan women, although her features were larger than normal,..." "....when a British ship's doctor, William Dunlop, took an interest in her. He was fascinated by her large backside and genitalia-common to Khoisan people.", again talking about how this was a common trait among the Khoisan's. Fascinated my ass, he was intrigued by her body as he as never seen anyone so well in doubt. When slavery was well on it's way not only just the white masters of the fields were "fascinated" with the women slaves that they raped them, however it went both ways that the wives of the masters, being fat and out of shape, were very fascinated by the stocky well built men slaves that they seduced them. Just how Sarah Baartman was seduced by telling her that that she was going to become rich by putting her body on display. The first sign of human trafficking, and possibly prostitution, although there isn't anything mentioned about in any article that I have read thus far. However I am sure that it went on and is kept hush hush.



Is it not enough, George Cuvier, that Sarah Baartman's body was exploited while she walked the earth, that now that she is dead, you mutilate her, and put pieces of her on display as though she is some freak show, some science project for the school science fair? A trophy that honors your findings? Why is Sarah Baartman not able to finally rest in peace as it usually written on one's tombstone? Or are those just words to make ourselves feel better about the loss of someone? Did you even shed a tear for her over what you and others put her through? Did you ever consider her a human being or just a side show for your own benefit, pleasure, and riches? How could Sarah Baartman be able to hold her head high knowing that she is only on exhibit? And we wonder why the women of today are silenced, and don't speak out when they are humiliated and objectified. They keep their mouths shut; Why? Because of decades and decades, and centuries of humiliation and degradation of their worth. Women have for years been looked upon as objects of pleasure and sexual desire, as was proven in the documentary "kiss me softly: 3". My 13 yr old son was able to see this documentary in one of my other classes, and his comment was, "Mom, who cares, they made the choice to do those ads, and pose for those pictures. Nobody forced them or put a gun to their head." Most would think like "OMG, he is already turning out to a womanizer", but in all actuality this opened up a great conversation, and allowed to two of to have a deep intellectual conversation that you wouldn't think a 13 yr old boy and his mother could have. Especially a mother who is considered to be a Feminist. I explained to him that he had a very good point, however that in the years of oppression, that in this day and time, that women are subjected and limited to what they need to do to make "the big bucks". If you notice anything that contributes largely to a woman's bank account, is considered to be sexual and contributes to the desire and sexual pleasure of the male species, and has a price to it as well and I'm not talking $$$. The price is her self-esteem, self-worth, her pride, her power of herself, control of her emotions and actions. She is not allowed to express her feelings because she is owned by someone who has the power and the say so, because they control on how much money she will receive. Prostitution, exotic dancing, modeling, pornography, pornographic films; even in Hollywood, an actresses income can be determined by how much skin she is willing to show. I have heard that Jennifer Lopez, who is also well known for her well-in doubt backside, actually has her butt insured for about $1,000,000,000. Sarah Baartman was not just an object of fascination, but an object of lustful fascination, however as a scientist, who is suppose to study and find out why the Khoisan's bodies are different than others in Eastern Europe, do a gene study, but to mutilate her body and cut it up in different pieces and then put it on display. " Georges Cuvier, you are no different than Jeffrey Daumer, you sick bastard"