Hogeland

Lisa Maria Hogeland

"Fear of Feminisim, Why Young Women Get The Willies"

Quotes

This essay focused on the younger generation's fear of feminism and tried to justify it. One of the first quotes is when she explains her motif, "This essay is an attempt to trace out what that "of course" really means; much of it is based on my experience with college students, but many of the observations apply to other young women as well". She has to define her meaning of "of course" because that was her response when her former students told her their students were afraid of feminism. To her it makes sense and throughout the essay she has reasonable facts one which was, "young women may believe that a feminist identity puts them out of the pool for many men"; she means that in this generation the definition of a feminist isn't as clear and those who aren't educated just assume that we are man haters/anti-men which is not true. The point is to fight the inequality between genders not bash the opposing gender. Another quote which basically says its okay to be afraid and I understand why you are. On the last page she says, “Women have real reasons to fear feminism, and we do young women no service if we suggest to them that feminism itself is safe… to stand opposed to your culture, to be critical of institutions, behaviors, discourses- when it is so clearly not in your immediate interest to do so-asks a lot of a young person…”. This is true not everyone is up for the movement and change is scary. However one thing she doesn't do is say they shouldn't be feminists she encourages them by saying the good things of feminism. The whole essay she explains a woman's struggle of identity, political place, etc. Then she explains the benefits of feminism and how it is intimidating but worth it.

http://columbiaspectator.com/2010/11/30/fear-feminism

Although I am very late with this post I agree with the author it's tough trying to be a feminist in this generation when you aren't educated on the subject or when you are in a society when its hard to find yourself. However I don't think it should discourage the younger generation to be part of the movement.