Andrew Gerbasi

Red

Feminism Essay
Although women are in some ways not equal to men in
contemporary America, this problem cannot be solved by legally
considering them a minority, since their inferiority is a different form
than it was at the time of the Equal Rights Amendment. In today's
society, women get paid less for the same work as men, and are often
inadvertently discriminated against for jobs. During the time of the
Equal Rights Amendment, women were openly and legally
discriminated against. This time up to as recent as thirty years ago
would have been an appropriate time to consider women a minority,
because the first step in women becoming fully equal to men was to
make them legally equal.

The Equal Rights Amendment said, "equality of rights under the

law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any
state on account of sex", which means women would have the same
legal rights as men. Since at the time of the Equal Rights Amendment
women did not legally have as many rights as men, passing the
amendment would have been efficient for making women legally equal
to men, which is the first step in making genders completely equal.

However, before it was set in stone, an activist named Phyllis

Schafly inspired America with writing and derailed its ratification.
Schafly did not support the amendment because she believed it would
not respect males' and females' differences that were essential to
consider for rational living. For example, she claims that it would
"require women to be drafted into military combat any time , take
away Social Security benefits for wives and widows", and "[give] the
federal government enormous new powers to reinterpret every law
that makes a distinction based on gender" (Schafly). She believed the
Equal Rights Amendment would take away women's individuality.

Susan Brownmiller believes that women should be less dictated

by men, directly opposing Schafly. Brownmiller states, for example,
that the "modern reality of rape as it is defined by twentieth-century
practice is not, however, the reality of rape as it is defined by
twentieth-century law" (Brownmiller 378). This shows that she feels a
legal change needs to be made regarding women and things such as
sexual assault, and would support the Equal Rights Amendment.

Women have historically been discriminated against, and even

though things such as pornography do not need to be considered a
form of hate against women since that is not what they are made for,
women have been discriminated during various time periods. However,

in contemporary America women should not be considered a minority,

because women are already past the stage of legal inferiority that
Brownmiller and Schafly were involved in. Since women are now legally
equal to men, separation of the genders that would take place from
rewarding only women as a minority would not allow women to go
forth in modern equality. Instead males and females should be thought
of as one.

Works Cited
Brownmiller, Susan. Against Our Will. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.
Schafly, Phyllis. "'Equal Rights' for Women: Wrong Then, Wrong Now."
LATimes.com. Los Angeles Times, n.d. Web. 3 May 2015.