Welcome to Contemporary Vocabularium!! Since this is my first post, I figured I’d give a brief explanation of what I’m going to do here. My goal is simple: I am going to take words that seem often misunderstood or misused in our society and define them. It is not my intent to redefine or give my own interpretation of any of these words, but merely to explain what they actually mean.

Originally, I was going to begin with a word that starts with “a” and continue posting alphabetically. BUT, since this is a brand new blog, I decided to skip some softball “a” word and start with something more interesting: feminism.

According to Merriam-Webster, feminism is:

Feminism (noun): the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities.

This is a perfectly adequate definition. What could be controversial about that?

However, judging by reactions in our society to the word, it is apparent that for some reason the belief in equal rights and opportunities for both sexes is somehow quite contentious. There was a news story in April about a middle school girl that wore a shirt that said “FEMINIST” in her yearbook photo and the principal had the word airbrushed out, citing that it might be considered “offensive.”

Offensive to whom?

Making this matter worse is the fact that the principal responsible for the decision is a woman herself. Indeed, there seems to an entire movement of women professing to be anti-feminist. Shailene Woodley is just one of many female celebrities to claim she’s not a feminist. There’s an entire tumblr page dedicated to “Women Against Feminism” and features pictures of women holding up handwritten messages about why they don’t need feminism. While a few of them may legitimately seem to believe that they really don’t need or deserve the same rights and opportunities as men, the majority seem to be a bit confused. One particularly silly example reads, “I don’t need feminism because I like men.” What exactly is anti-men about believing that women deserve equal rights and opportunities as them? Others take issue with the behavior of some self-identifying feminists. This doesn’t change the meaning of the word. Saying you’re not a feminist because you don’t like the way some self-identifying feminists act is like saying you don’t believe in racial equality because you have a problem with Al Sharpton. Seems a bit ridiculous, doesn’t it?

Quite a few of these posts bring up the word “egalitarianism.” Just so I’ve covered all my bases, I’ll define it as well. According to Merriam-Webster, egalitarianism is:

Egalitarianism (noun): a belief in human equality with respect to social, political, and economic affairs

So egalitarianism covers pretty much everything. Race, religion, economic status, etc. It also covers gender. So yes, you can identify yourself as an egalitarian, and you should. But it is completely contradictory to say you’re not a feminist but are an egalitarian. If you don’t believe in equality between the sexes, then you can’t possibly believe in equality amongst everyone.

This raises the question that if feminism is about equality, why is is called FEMinism? Couldn’t there be a better name for it? To answer this question, you need only look back at the history of the feminist movement, which began in earnest with legal issues, such as women’s suffrage, in the 19th and early 20th century. In a time when women couldn’t even vote, believing in equal rights and opportunities between men and women meant ADVOCATING for women. And here’s the kicker: it still does. Women make on average 78% of what men do for the same work in the US today. The US Congress is 80% male. Sure, it can be debated to what degree gender inequality exists and women have made huge social and political gains in the past century. But even where there is legal protection, there is not always de facto equality. If you believe in equality between men and women, then by necessity, you must believe in advocacy for women. That’s just how it works.

If we one day find ourselves living in a world that has achieved equal rights opportunities for men and women, then perhaps we can create a new word to reflect that. Until then, the word for that ideal is (and will remain) feminism.

There are lots of different ways to be a feminist. Some are more vocal than others. Disagreeing with a feminist doesn’t make you an anti-feminist. Liking men doesn’t make you an anti-feminist. Being a man doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t be a feminist. Saying you believe in equal rights and opportunities for men and women should be neither controversial nor offensive to anyone. If you understand the definition, saying you’re a feminist isn’t either.

If you made it all the way to the bottom, thanks for reading. Feel free to comment and let me know what you think. I also invite suggestions for new words to tackle.