Empowering gender equality
When the first female students walked on campus to go to class 100 years ago, Marquette was a different world. Gradually, it has evolved into a world with just as many obstacles but a much brighter future.
According to Mary Anne Siderits, an assistant professor of psychology, this is the time not only to celebrate the centenniel of women at Marquette, but also to continue moving forward using the accomplishments that women have achieved.
Siderits says its time to pay attention to the important lessons women have given society.
Women can enter career fields previously thought unsuitable for them. According to Siderits, society should take a “no holds barred” approach to women’s roles. Even though this may not be completely accepted, it is becoming more so.
This is not just subject to the female gender, however. Empowerment comes when society does not feel the need to trade or specify roles, but rather to open up possibilities for both genders.
“If women’s roles are liberated, the necessary complement is that men’s roles are liberated, too,” Siderits said. “Women and men are free to do what flows from their capacity, interests, wishes and dispositions as persons — not just as their gender.”
Empowerment is not only an important lesson in regards to economic statuses or job qualifications. It also applies to how women are viewed in the media.
Modern culture impresses dangerous values upon young women, according to Ana Garner, an associate professor in the College of Communication professor. Portraying women as scantily-clad sex objects in the media shows that there is still a great need for young women to learn that their power does not just reside in their sexuality.
“I would like to have the world accept and see women as empowered full citizens instead of just sexual citizens,” Garner said.
According to Elaine Maly, executive director of the Women’s Fund of Greater Milwaukee, even when women are seen as businesswomen in the media, it’s frequently still in a sexual manner.
There are however, many successful and powerful young men and women who can be leaders for others.
According to Maly, channeling women’s natural power is something that the Women’s Fund of Greater Milwaukee is working toward. By providing a network of philanthropy, the organization harnesses “the power that women already have for social change that we want to see,” she said. This in turn creates a basis for the social change into women-led solutions.
Maly also said that women are still not necessarily on the same level as men in pay equality.
“There is talk about women and how successful women have become — their economic power and being in places of leadership they have never been at before,” Maly said. “But we need to be careful because what that means is some women have gotten ahead, but women have certainly not reached parity.”
The best way to reach economic equality is through education. More women than ever are attending college, working to reach job and economic equity.
“It’s no secret that education is the most surefire way to achieve longterm success and economic independence,” Maly said.
Much like the liberation of women’s roles in society liberates men, the education of women will in turn educate society.
“What people are coming to understand is that when you invest in women and girls, they take care of their families,” Maly said. “When families are thriving, communities thrive and whole cities, towns, states and nations thrive.”
Thriving communities create greater opportunities for equal participation in society. The United Nations Development Programme for Women Empowerment understands the importance for gender equality in society.
“Development cannot be achieved if 50 percent of the population is excluded from the opportunities it brings,” said Helen Clark, an ambassador for the UNDP.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon discussed the importance of the role of equality in democratic governance. “If any man asks why I support better accountability to women, here’s my response: because a government that answers to women will answer to you, too,” he said in a report.
Gender equality is not just a global issue. It also needs to be addressed on Marquette’s campus, according to Desiree Valentine, chair of Marquette’s feminist group Empowerment. Empowerment focuses on creating safe and open discourse about gender issues facing Marquette and the college culture.
According to Valentine, the group looks to move past formal equality, or equality under the law, which she believes the feminist movement has already achieved. Instead, she said Empowerment aims to remove de facto discrimination, or discrimination by practice.
“This is just on a daily basis,” Valentine said about de facto discrimination. “There is still ridiculously high numbers of sexual assault on college campus and the world at large.”
To fight these issues and to advocate women’s empowerment, Valentine stresses the importance of discussion. She said that when speaking with her peers about Empowerment’s cause, she tries to do it with an open mind and has found it “eye opening.”
A century ago when women looked ahead, they envisioned great possibilities. That imagination was the force that created the world today. It’s possible the best lesson young women can learn is to create high expectations for their futures and work to achieve them.
“It is important for each generation of college students to learn that we are counting on them to continue to work on equity around the world — for everyone,” Maly said. “With each generation, we make progress, but the job is not done.”
Tags: Empowerment, equality, equity, women, women in society
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