Between 1970 and 1975, three books by Australian authors had a remarkable impact not only at home but around the world.

Animal Liberation by Peter Singer

Peter Singer's book, Animal Liberation, was published in 1975. ( Wikimedia Commons: Joel Travis Sage )

Singer is now a professor of philosophy at Princeton but visits Australia often, not least to speak at literary festivals.

Animal Liberation: A New Ethics for Our Treatment of Animals explained how other living creatures deserve kindness too, and how a dismissal of their needs compared to ours is "speciesism".

The concept of caring for animals has grown worldwide and changed the dietary habits of millions.

I am continually impressed that his insights are increasingly backed up by scientific experiments showing that birds can be immensely clever and that yes, sorry about that, even fish feel pain.

The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer

Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch became an influential text for the feminist movement. ( Flickr: Helen Morgan CC-BY-2.0 )

Greer's most famous book followed the magnificent Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir, which was published in 1949.

The Female Eunuch, which came out in 1970, rattled a world that thought itself advanced but which still treated women like chattels, skivvies or, as Kathy Lette put it, "sperm spittoons".

Even the prejudice that Charles Darwin espoused — dismissing women as lesser creatures with smaller brains and therefore inferior intellects — persisted.

In science in Australia, women still occupy few top positions. Professor Emma Johnston, pro vice-chancellor at the University of New South Wales told the National Press Club that the number of female professors in 2015 was 17 per cent of the total.

Now in 2016 the figure has fallen to 16 per cent! Eunuchs, indeed.



Homosexual: Oppression and Liberation by Dennis Altman

Dennis Altman wrote the influential book Homosexual: Oppression and Liberation, published in 1971. ( Supplied: Wind & Sky Productions )

Altman's book, perhaps the least well known of the three, was published in 1971. It made a huge impact all over the world and its ideas are still resonating.

This year the UK even passed a "Turing pardon" law, named after British computer pioneer Alan Turing, allowing for the reversal of the convictions once imposed on homosexuals caught being themselves.

The recognition of gay behaviour as being normal but different rather than pathological still has a way to go in many countries.

As Australia still has its own clumsy contortions with marriage laws, Altman, now a professor at La Trobe University, still has work to do.

It is remarkable that these three books were all first published within five years of each other, between 1970 and 1975.

Can we think of their equivalents here in the 21st century?