Women's and men's movement in the U.S.

After reading chapters 3 and 4 in Gendered Lives, I didn't realize how much action has taken place in our country's history in regards to the feminist and antifeminist movements.  Growing up in a Mexican cultural background, the women almost always played the domestic roles or cooking, cleaning, caring for the children; the men, on the other hand, were the always the bread winners, and had very little to do with the raising of their children unless they had to discipline the kids for not obeying their mothers. Furthermore, my parents came from small towns that were distant from large cities; it’s possible to assume that even if feminist movements were active in the nearest large cities in Mexico, the likelihood of it reaching those small towns was nearly impossible.

Three Waves of Women's Movements:

The author made a very valid point on the presumptions that many people believed that the feminine movement had started in the 1960s; I was one of those people.  Given that I was born in this generation, I didn't really take into consideration the struggles that women had faced with women's suffrage, the second wave in the 60s in regards to women’s equal rights, and lastly, the third wave, that has risen to address issues of domestic violence and equal rights. 

            I was a bit shocked to have read about the various feminist groups that have emerged throughout the three waves.  Growing up, I had always thought of feminism as being lumped into one category focused on a political spectrum.  It was interesting how some feminists, though fighting for the same cause, were still segregated by color and social class. The same could be said about the men’s movement as well, which I’ll discuss about later.

            I have much respect for the third wave feminist movement, because they embody women of various ethnicities, social classes, they’re appearances, and lastly, sexual orientation.  It’s a new movement, and the author states that they haven’t exactly found a “center”, meaning that they haven’t yet come to a consensus on who they are and where they are going.

Men’s Movements:

What I found to be interesting in this reading was that Frederick Douglas was not only an abolitionist, but also an active supporter of women’s basic rights.  Furthermore, I was very unaware of the array of men’s profeminist and masculinist men’s movements.  What I admired the most about the profeminists was that they openly addressed sexism in the workplace, called traitorous identity.  This clever rhetoric was put into practice when females in the workplace would criticize their negative attitudes about sexist jokes and males would refer to them as being overly sensitive; however, when their male co-worker(s) would criticize the men telling the sexist jokes, they would be overcome with shame.  I thought that was brilliant!

            Although the author was able to mention various profeminist and masculinist men’s movements, I was a bit disappointed that the struggles of the Chicano/a Movement were not mentioned.  Chicano/as faced the same struggles with labor, racism, and equal rights just like the other minorities in the U.S.; furthermore, the Chicana Movement struggled even more for acceptance/tolerance in amongst their male counterparts, mainly due to machismo attitude views. I realize that this is a different course of study, but I highly believe that this movement at deserved some recognition for their cause.