Choice and labels

There are two things I want to address quickly within this entry.

The first one is why I identify as a feminist. There have been a couple of people questioning my use of this label. Well basically (desire for gender equality aside) when I look at the feminist movement I see it as a fight for choice. Examples of this are as follows:

Women having voting rights, this is political choice

"My body, my choice" is self evident

I see choice as the way to achieve true equality in society. I worry less about the amount of female CEO's, although I admit this may be one way of examining if inequality in choice still exists, and more about if true choice for women (and men) exists.

As for the media display that "women can have it all" this is a flawed model that many people have drawn attention to as a flaw in feminism. Actually, feminism renounces this representation as harmful for women. Regardly of what people may have convinced themselves, feminism's job is not quite done.

Also before you ask, I support women staying at home with the children and cooking for their husband (anti-marriage aside for now) if that is their choice to do so and how they go about maximising their happiness. I don't see it as a betrayal of myself or feminism.


Furthering on from this theme the other point I wanted to address is the concept of labels. Ignore my feminist label for one moment, what if I had called myself "Egalitarian open to criticism"? Would the criticism to support ratio have inverted? In regards to the exact same views?

Just because feminism has a bad name doesn't make it a good reason to drop it as a label, in fact I feel it is even more of a reason to adopt it as a proud label and attempt to change public opinion.