second
wave
feminism
Second-wave feminism, which emerged in the early 1960s and continued into the 1980s, expanded on the groundwork laid by first-wave feminists, focusing on a broader range of issues beyond suffrage. It addressed gender equality in areas such as workplace discrimination, reproductive rights, sexual liberation, and legal inequalities. Influenced by civil rights movements, second-wave feminists sought to challenge and deconstruct societal norms that limited women's roles. Second-wave feminism was instrumental in advocating for changes such as the legalization of birth control, the right to abortion, and equal opportunities in education and employment.
"Second-Wave Feminism," Against the Current
overview
Second-wave feminism focused on the legal, economic, and social rights of women. Its top priorities included gender roles, reproductive rights, financial independence, workplace equality, and domestic violence.
what was first-wave feminism about?
Second-wave feminism would never have occurred if it weren't for the first wave. First-wave feminism was all about fighting for women's legal rights, especially the right to vote. In 1848, a big meeting called the Seneca Falls Convention took place, where around 300 people came together to talk about gender equality and what the movement should focus on. At first, feminism was connected with other movements like temperance (which wanted to limit alcohol) and the fight to end slavery. Although Black leaders like Frederick Douglass and Ida B. Wells worked with both the feminist and civil rights movements, the ideas of white women were more common in first-wave feminism. In 1920, the 19th Amendment was passed in the U.S., giving women the right to vote. A few years later, in 1928, women in the UK also won the right to vote.
"The Waves of Feminism, and Why People Keep Fighting Over Them, Explained," Vox
what triggered the second wave?
The idea of "waves" of feminism isn’t perfect because feminist movements have always been more complicated, but it's a simple way to talk about different periods of change. Second-wave feminism started in the 1960s and lasted for about 20 years. Thanks to the first wave, women had gained important legal rights like the right to vote and own property. But even with these changes, gender inequality was still a big issue. In 1949, a French writer named Simone de Beauvoir published a famous book called The Second Sex. In it, she argued that biology doesn't determine gender differences—it's actually society’s ideas about gender that make people think women are less important than men. The ideas in The Second Sex influenced feminist thinkers for many years. In 1963, Betty Friedan wrote The Feminine Mystique, a book that challenged the belief that women could only find happiness by being stay-at-home moms and wives. Friedan pointed out that many women actually felt unfulfilled and unhappy. While her ideas weren’t completely new, The Feminine Mystique became very popular and had a big impact. Friedan’s book, along with Simone de Beauvoir's work, things like the birth control pill, the Civil Rights movement, and laws like the Equal Pay Act of 1963, were key to the growth of second-wave feminism.
5 main ideas:
1. traditional gender roles restrict women
In the first wave of feminism, women mainly fought for the right to vote and didn’t challenge traditional roles like being a wife and mother. In the 1950s, women were expected to stay home while men worked. Second-wave feminism, starting in the 1960s, challenged these ideas, with women speaking out against stereotypes and limited roles. Some activists wanted big changes to society, while others focused on smaller reforms, but all were concerned with how gender roles restricted women.
2. reproductive rights are essential to equality
While first-wave feminists didn’t focus much on reproductive rights, second-wave feminists made it a key issue. They believed everyone should have control over their own bodies and decisions about things like having children and reproductive health. Before the 1960s, abortion was illegal in many places, and in some countries, like the UK, it could lead to life in prison. Second-wave feminists worked hard to change this. In 1960, the first birth control pill was approved in the U.S., and in 1973, the Supreme Court ruled that women had the right to an abortion. Feminists around the world also pushed for laws that protected these rights and created support networks for women’s health.
3. women deserve financial independence
Credit cards, which allow people to buy things and pay later, have been around since ancient times, but modern credit cards are relatively new. In 1950, Diners Club introduced the first universal credit card, originally for paying restaurant bills, but it soon spread to other services. By 1953, several countries, including Canada and the UK, accepted Diners Club cards. American Express launched the first plastic charge card in 1958, making it easier for people to shop without carrying cash. However, credit cards weren’t available to everyone at first. Women had to have a man co-sign for a credit card, and even if they made all the payments, the card wasn’t in their name. This was because women were seen as "riskier" borrowers. In 1974, the U.S. passed the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, making it illegal to discriminate against women, and the UK followed in 1975.
4. the workplace should be equal
Women have always worked, but their jobs were often undervalued, and they were limited in the types of careers they could have. During World War II, many women took over men's jobs in fields like mechanics and engineering, proving they could do the work just as well. After the war, many women lost these jobs, but their success showed they were capable of more. In the 1960s, women made up two-thirds of the job growth in the U.S., although they still faced sexism in the workplace. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 made it illegal to discriminate based on sex, but women still faced challenges, like being fired for getting pregnant until 1978. Second-wave feminism fought for equal opportunities, better pay, and protection from harassment and discrimination at work.
5. domestic violence is a serious problem
For a long time, violence against women was ignored and even seen as normal. It was accepted for men to hit their wives for "corrective purposes," and while extreme violence wasn’t encouraged, it wasn’t considered a crime against the woman herself. By 1920, wife-beating was illegal in all U.S. states, but punishments were usually light. In the 1960s, women gained more rights, but domestic violence still wasn't fully recognized. Second-wave feminists worked to bring attention to domestic violence by opening shelters and rape crisis centers. In 1972, the first emergency rape line was set up in Washington, D.C., and in 1973, the term “domestic violence” was used for the first time in the UK Parliament. Feminists also pushed for legal changes, and by 1993, marital rape was made illegal across the U.S.
"The Rise and Fall of the Trad Wife," The New Yorker
"The Real Backlash Never Ended," The New Yorker
"Second Wave of Feminism," Sutori
"Second-Wave Feminism," John Riddel
branches of feminism
During second-wave feminism, several branches emerged, each focusing on different aspects of gender equality. Some groups worked for legal rights and reforms, while others, wanted a complete change in society. There were also feminists who linked gender equality with economic issues, and feminists who highlighted the unique struggles of women of color. Overall, these branches helped make the feminist movement more diverse and focused on different ways to challenge inequality.
major streams of feminism
Three major streams of thought surfaced. The first was liberal, or mainstream, feminism, which focused its energy on concrete and pragmatic change at an institutional and governmental level. Its goal was to integrate women more thoroughly into the power structure and to give women equal access to positions men had traditionally dominated. While aiming for strict equality (to be evidenced by such measures as an equal number of women and men in positions of power, or an equal amount of money spent on male and female student athletes), these liberal feminist groups nonetheless supported the modern equivalent of protective legislation such as special workplace benefits for mothers.
In contrast to the pragmatic approach taken by liberal feminism, radical feminism aimed to reshape society and restructure its institutions, which they saw as inherently patriarchal. Providing the core theory for modern feminism, radicals argued that women’s subservient role in society was too closely woven into the social fabric to be unraveled without a revolutionary revamping of society itself. They strove to supplant hierarchical and traditional power relationships they saw as reflecting a male bias, and they sought to develop nonhierarchical and antiauthoritarian approaches to politics and organization.
Finally, cultural or “difference” feminism, the last of the three currents, rejected the notion that men and women are intrinsically the same and advocated celebrating the qualities they associated with women, such as their greater concern for affective relationships and their nurturing preoccupation with others. Inherent in its message was a critique of mainstream feminism’s attempt to enter traditionally male spheres. This was seen as denigrating women’s natural inclinations by attempting to make women more like men.
more on radical feminism
More radical feminists, like their colleagues in other movements, were dissatisfied with merely redressing economic issues. They devised their own brand of consciousness-raising events and symbolic attacks on women’s oppression.
The most famous of these was an event staged in September 1968 by New York Radical Women. Protesting stereotypical notions of femininity and rejecting traditional gender expectations, the group demonstrated at the Miss America Pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey, to bring attention to the contest’s—and society’s—exploitation of women. The protestors crowned a sheep Miss America and then tossed instruments of women’s oppression, including high-heeled shoes, curlers, girdles, and bras, into a “freedom trash can.” News accounts famously, and incorrectly, described the protest as a “bra burning."
"Key Events of Feminism During the 1960s in the U.S.,"
ThoughtCo
civil rights movement
Many second-wave feminists, especially women of color, were inspired by the Civil Rights Movement's efforts to challenge racial injustice and demand equality. Just as the Civil Rights Movement sought to end segregation and discrimination against Black people, second-wave feminists worked to dismantle sexism and expand women's rights. Both movements shared goals of equality and justice, with feminist activists often participating in civil rights protests, while Civil Rights leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. supported gender equality.
from the civil rights movement to women's liberation
Like the suffrage movement, second-wave feminism drew criticism for centering privileged white women, and some Black women formed their own feminist organizations, including the National Black Feminist Organization (NBFO). Despite its achievements, the women’s liberation movement had begun to lose momentum by 1980, when conservative forces swept Ronald Reagan to the White House.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the Civil Rights Movement was creating a climate of protest as activists claimed rights and new positions in society for people of color.
The 60s and 70s lit a spark in the movement because of the arousal and growing tensions between the Women’s Liberation Movement and the Civil Rights Movement. Second wave of feminism turned a blind eye towards the needs and struggles of Black queer women, as Audre Lorde said, white women fail feminism in their “refusal to recognize differences and to examine the distortions which result from misnaming them.” With steps being made that further separated the two groups, Black women set out to build their own movement, separating from mainstream, white-dominated women’s liberation movement and deploying black feminism centralized around intersectionality.
Women filled significant roles in organizations fighting for civil rights like the Student National Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). However, women often found that those organizations—enlightened as they might have been about racial issues or the war in Vietnam—could still be influenced by patriarchal ideas of male superiority.
important materials
Two members of SNCC, Casey Hayden and Mary King, presented some of their concerns about their organization’s treatment of women in a document entitled “On the Position of Women in SNCC,” which argued that SNCC practiced discrimination against women similar to the discrimination practiced against African Americans by whites. Stokely Carmichael, field organizer and future chairman of SNCC, joked that the position for women in the movement was “prone.”
One of the most influential Black feminists of this era was Bell Hooks, who wrote the groundbreaking book "Ain't I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism." In her work, she explored the intersectionality of race, gender, and class. Hooks argued that mainstream feminism had failed to address the unique experiences and needs of Black women and other women of color, and that a more inclusive and intersectional approach was needed. For example, as white women fought for the right to work, Black women had been in the workforce for sometime. Black women weren’t fighting for the right to work, they were fighting for higher wages, better working conditions, childcare and more.
Nevertheless, the Civil Rights Movement contributed materially to women's rights. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited discrimination in employment on the basis of race, color, national origin, and religion, also prohibited discrimination on the basis of sex in Title VII. Ironically, protection for women had been included at the suggestion of a Virginia congressman in an attempt to prevent the act’s passage; his reasoning seemed to be that, while a white man might accept that African Americans needed and deserved protection from discrimination, the idea that women deserved equality with men would be far too radical for any of his male colleagues to contemplate. Nevertheless, the act passed, granting broad workplace protections to women and minorities.
achievements
Second-wave feminism achieved significant progress in many areas, pushing for legal and social equality. The movement led to greater workplace protections against discrimination and sexual harassment, and it raised awareness about domestic violence. Feminists fought for educational equality, resulting in more opportunities for women in higher education and careers. These achievements helped shift societal views on gender roles and paved the way for future advancements in women’s rights.
as a political force
Feminism—or “women’s liberation”—gained strength as a political force in the 1970s, as Friedan, Gloria Steinem and Bella Abzug founded the National Women’s Political Caucus in 1971. High points of the second wave included passage of the Equal Pay Act and the landmark Supreme Court decisions in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) and Roe v. Wade (1973) related to reproductive freedom. But while Congress passed the Equal Rights Amendment in 1972, a conservative backlash ensured it fell short of the number of states needed for ratification.
The Feminine Mystique
Just as the abolitionist movement made nineteenth-century women more aware of their lack of power and encouraged them to form the first women’s rights movement--sometimes called first-wave feminism--the protest movements of the 1960s inspired many white and middle-class women to create their own organized movement for greater rights--known as second-wave feminism. Many were older, married women who found the traditional roles of housewife and mother unfulfilling.
In 1963, writer and feminist Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique, a nonfiction book in which she contested the post-World War II belief that it was women’s destiny to marry and bear children. Friedan’s book was a best-seller and began to raise the consciousness of many women who agreed that homemaking in the suburbs sapped them of their individualism and left them unsatisfied.
NOW
In 1966, the National Organization for Women (NOW), formed and proceeded to set an agenda for the feminist movement. Framed by a statement of purpose written by Friedan, the agenda began by proclaiming NOW’s goal to make possible women’s participation in all aspects of American life and to gain for them all the rights enjoyed by men. Among the specific goals set was the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), a proposed Constitutional Amendment guaranteeing equal rights for women. First introduced in Congress in 1923, the ERA was passed in 1972 but failed to receive the 38 state ratifications necessary to become part of the Constitution. It has yet to be adopted today.
the pill
Medical science also contributed a tool to assist women in their liberation. In 1960, the US Food and Drug Administration approved the birth control pill, freeing women from the restrictions of pregnancy and childbearing. Women who were able to limit, delay, and prevent reproduction were freer to work, attend college, and delay marriage. Within five years of the pill’s approval, some six million women were using it.
The pill was the first medicine ever intended to be taken by people who were not sick. Even conservatives saw it as a possible means of making marriages stronger by removing the fear of an unwanted pregnancy and improving the health of women. Its opponents, however, argued that it would promote sexual promiscuity, undermine the institutions of marriage and the family, and destroy the moral code of the nation. By the early 1960s, 30 states had made it a criminal offense to sell contraceptive devices.