Can All Feminists Get Along? By Kate Krimson

I think that often in America we forget that a feminist is a person who believes that women and men should have equal rights. Many liberals and conservatives are feminists. Many men and women are feminists. Yet the media tries to make it look like that to be a feminist you must be a liberal woman. Why does the media create such a big divide between what they consider true feminists and what an actual feminist is? There is only one reason for the big divide and that’s the abortion issue. It is the main issue on which feminists disagree. As if one issue could possibly define a whole group of people who are fed up with inequality. While there is one issue that feminists disagree on, there are so many on which they agree: the end to child prostitution both in the U.S. and abroad, the end to the sexual assault that continues to go unpunished in the U.S. military, and more.

Many feminists can agree that when women run for office the media makes them bigger targets for harsh and often sexist criticism than their male counterparts.



In the last few minutes of this clip, Geraldine Ferraro and Sarah Palin show how they agree on this issue, even though they belong to different parties. Also, Palin shows admiration and gratitude for what Ferraro has done in her political career which has paved the road for the women that have followed her into the political sphere.

Both liberal and conservative media agree that the so-called “honor killings” that have been taking place in the Middle East and elsewhere are backward and monstrous. Both Ms. Magazine’s Blog and the National Review discussed the attempted “honor killing” of Harry Potter movie star, Afshan Azad, by her father and brother for her dating a Hindu man. Anushay Hossain in her Ms. Blog called the event is part “an unfortunate but very real and rising trend amongst the British-Muslim community.” (http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2010/07/03/harry-potter-star-may-have-been-in-attempted-honor-killing/)Phyllis Chesler in her National Review article called “honor killings” a problem that is “vast and growing.” (http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/232735/honor-killings-rise-phyllis-chesler).

When it comes to feminism, politics, and life in general I think it is time that we stop dividing ourselves and start unifying ourselves. An issue has more power when more people are behind it, but with dividing lines between us we will never be strong enough to overturn vicious ways of past and present for the future.