Modern day feminism, we now live in a world where women have more rights than ever before yet we are constantly suppressed and still face inequalities within our society, politically and economically. Feminism will always remain within our societies as it is something that needs to be fought and people need to be enlightened to. Until both men and women are treated equally within every society on the planet feminism will remain. It is a huge part of many peoples lives, some are against it and don’t really know anything about it and so resort to belittling it and undermining it as they seem to fear it. People often don’t know about feminism and the movement behind it so they bash it thinking that feminists are a bunch of middle aged women with hair arm pits, who don’t wear bras and hate men. This is the complete opposite of what feminists stand for and what feminism is all about. We aren’t here to say that men aren’t as good as women or that women should be running the world and make men see how it feels to be suppressed and belittled by the opposite sex. Feminism is looking for equality, for men and women to live equally among each other and for women to be seen as human beings and equals rather than as objects or less human because of their sex. We need to understand that slut shaming isn’t acceptable and the double standards placed on men and women is so wrong and unjustifiable. As a modern and supposedly more educated society we need to realise that wanting equality isn’t a bad thing and feeling that women are suppressed is actually happening. Across the world we are at different stages of feminism, some are fighting for the right to vote like in Saudi Arabia (up until 2015) and Vatican City, some are fighting for the right to their education in places like Nigeria and Pakistan and many women are fighting for equal pay and equal standards within society. Feminism is such a huge topic and there is still so much to fight for and to stand for, it just takes someone to stand out and want to make that change and want to make the world and much better and equal place.

“I’ve always considered myself a feminist, although I was always afraid of that word because people put so much on it, when honestly, it’s very simple. It’s just a person that believes in equality for men and women.” – Beyonce Knowles Carter

Modern day feminism is continuously growing and different issues and inequalities are coming up daily. Women across the world are being singled out purely because of their sex especially now in Europe, women are beginning to stand up against the way women are treated. For example, the Pussy Riot band in Russia go against Putin and make songs exclusively aimed at Putin himself. Another modern feminist group are the Femen group, an organisation of young women from the Ukraine  who protest around with no tops on. Feminism is forever growing and more and more people are becoming aware of this. A news paper article that I have read recently, written by Rachel Spence, on feminism within art nowadays. ‘Women in art | Exhibitions held together purely by gender may be inadequate, even distasteful – but are they still a necessary evil?’ – Rachel Spence. The article basically talks about how women only exhibitions are almost offensive and kind of single women out rather than putting them onto the same level as men. We need to realise that both men and women are equally capable of making great art and we shouldn’t be looked at for our sex. I don’t want someone to look at my work and say ‘that’s good for a woman’. I want people to look at me as a photographer/filmmaker without having the label ‘female’ in front of it. I understand that these exhibitions are highlighting the success of women and somewhat empowering women that we are good enough to have our own work exhibited and it does bring light to female artists yet I really do think that it defeats the purpose and the aim that women want to achieve. I really want to get the message across that we should not be defined by our sex in any form of work. I hate hearing people say ‘male nurse’, ‘female doctor’, ‘male nanny’, ‘female boss’. I don’t know why we are labelled with our sex in front of our job description just because it seems unusual for a man or a woman to be doing that job.
Another interesting part of the article that I read was that only 7% of works on the walls of MoMA are women. I find this really shocking as women are so poorly represented here. This isn’t actually too shocking as I don’t actually know of many female artists/photographers that do have a strong backing and great work, like Cindy Sherman. I feel that women are underrepresented within the art world and yet become the subject of so many paintings and images. Historically, women have been objectified in paintings and almost made unidentifiable in works such as Picasso’s as he used geometric shapes to create his images which made the women faceless and more as objects rather than human beings. ‘In the US, women make up 60 per cent of art students but just 30 per cent of representation in galleries’ – Rachel Spence. This statement is quite shocking to me as it is so strange to have the statistics that only half the women that are within the creative industry and learning the trade are being successful and actually being exhibited. I feel that there is a prejudice within many careers and societies that women are less capable than men. I find this notion ridiculous as we are only focusing on the small-minded opinions from hundreds of years ago. Women fought for their right to vote, for their right to an education and women have fought and finally we live in a more equal world than it was a hundred years ago. Women have done more than prove themselves capable of being equal to men and keeping up with men. I just cannot comprehend why someone would focus on my sex rather than actually looking at the content that I create and the brains behind it. Women are suppressed all over the world in first, second and third world countries. We are just at different levels. I feel that suppression of women can also be related to a more extreme form of segregation in the rights of black people. In America so many black people are still fighting, loosing their lives and being singled out purely because of the colour of their skin. I don’t understand. Why does any of this matter to people? We shouldn’t be focused on the colour of someone’s skin, their background or their gender, it is so irrelevant. Just because I am female does not mean that I am less capable than a man and just because I am a female does not mean that I cannot think in the same way that a man does and just because I am female does not mean that I am less intelligent than a man. Equality comes when people recognise that there is something wrong and act on it. When people actually stand up for what is right, this is where change happens. Feminism isn’t just about women and feminism doesn’t only have female members, the more men get involved the more we are can recognise as equals and co-exist.

“as long as women aren’t free, men won’t be either.” – Noah Berlatsky

The Guardian article on feminism [written by Antony Loewenstein]  http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/28/feminism-lite-is-letting-down-the-women-who-need-it-the-most