The Second Wave - Its Impact on Ethnicity

The Second Wave

Its Impact on Ethnicity

The second-wave of feminism began in the 1960's at a time when civil rights for Blacks was in the forefront. Feminists of this time brought on a social movement that made great and promising accomplishments for equality and women's rights. Women were inspired by demands for respect and justice that the Civil Rights activist were seeking. The second-wave started along the same route as the first-wave essentially as an interest of educated, White middle-class women. As the second wave progressed, the minority and working class women began to take charge and address issues that affected them culturally. Minority women had to overcome many cultural hurdles while working to overcome the idea that the White feminist movement was form of assimilation.

The common concerns of the second-wave differed than those of the first-wave whose chief focus was the suffrage movement. The second-wave concerns addressed crimes against women; rape, battery, incest, murder, and spousal abuse. Other issues such as unequal pay, inadequate childcare, poverty, and age discrimination had no racial boundaries. The second-wave made the needs of working women its priority. Feminists fought for the right for women to enter traditionally male occupations and worked to change labor unions views of female union members. Minority women shared the same concerns along overcoming intercultural adversity and racism. They had a loyalty to their cultural differences from white feminists yet found themselves fighting the inequalities within their own race.

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The African American feminists were at odds with the White feminist. They felt that the White feminists were racist and were not as concerned with their plight. Theirs was a struggle against stereotypes that depicted them of living what appeared to be liberated lives: Working outside the home, raising their children in single parent homes, and less likely to be helpless in adverse conditions. Traditionally, African American women worked in low paying jobs and lived in poverty. African American women had endured much more discrimination than the White women had ever experienced. Their fight was more about race than equality. They encountered all of the same oppressions of White women along with racism. They had been struggling in a society that ignored their poverty and abuse for generations long before the second-wave push for women's individual rights.

Chicana feminist battled with loyal Chicanos with respect to gender roles. Machismo, masculine pride, was one of the biggest hurdles for Chicana feminists. Chicano men did not want their women to adopt the independent lifestyle that was being promoted by the feminist movement. Chicanas had to overcome the accusations that they were "anti-family, anti-cultural, anti-man and anti-Chicano". (Garcia, p532) The Chicana feminists still felt a strong connection to their cultural heritage yet they wanted to enrich their lives and protect themselves from the violence that was viewed as private within their community. They viewed themselves as strong women who worked to maintain the family traditions. Despite the harassment they experienced within their own race, they worked hard to bring to the forefront the struggles of their people such as welfare rights, childcare within their communities and rights for undocumented workers.

Having lived the majority of my life close to the Chicano influence, it is easy to see that they are a culture full of family pride. They choose to resolve their differences within their own

community. It is not too far from tradition for these women to be working alongside their men supporting their families and communities. The second-wave mainly put in place protections from violence that is still often kept private.

American Indian women were encumbered with the issues of tribal sovereignty along with their joint concerns with Indian women's rights as individuals. Theirs was a political struggle to protect the survival of their social structure while working to protect themselves from the social issues being addressed by the mainstream feminist movement. American Indian women have long lived in a society that shunned the Colonialist way of life. American Indian women were more interested in preserving the life they were currently living (Shanley p. 538).

For Asian feminists, the discrimination of being "other" was foremost. Being viewed as property of their husbands and fathers, isolated and inferior in every way, they fought against stereotypes of being "exotica and china dolls". Asian women had already been organizing within their own cultures to empower other Asian women. Their main concerned was caring for abandoned women and children and providing legal services for refugee women. (Shah, p 540, 541).

One common opinion among anti-feminists that feminists were all Lesbian. Anti-feminists missed the important ideal that feminism was a political movement focused on the improvement of the lives of all women, whether they were Heterosexual or Lesbian. The feminist movement did acknowledge and support Lesbians. It was not the focus of the feminist

movement to convert women to Lesbianism. Feminists supported the right of every woman to 'express her sexuality in any way she chooses as an affirmation of her individuality.' (Skinner, p239).

Beyond the cultural barriers within the second-wave, feminist were key to educating women through