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Sexism: the story on HearLore | HearLore
Sexism
On the 18th of November 1965, a woman named Pauline M. Leet stood before a Student-Faculty Forum at Franklin and Marshall College and uttered a word that would eventually define a global struggle. She coined the term sexism to describe the systemic prejudice against women, drawing a direct parallel to racism. Before that moment, the concept existed in practice but lacked a specific name to unite the movement. Leet's definition was simple yet revolutionary: she argued that discrimination based on gender was not merely a personal slight but a structural issue comparable to racial oppression. This linguistic shift allowed activists to move from complaining about individual acts of meanness to challenging entire systems of power. The term did not appear in print until three years later, in 1968, when Caroline Bird delivered a speech titled On Being Born Female to the Episcopal Church Executive Council. The Oxford English Dictionary now recognizes that publication as the first printed appearance of the word, cementing its place in the lexicon of social justice. The invention of this single word transformed the way society understood the relationship between men and women, turning scattered grievances into a coherent political force.
Witchcraft And The Hammer Of Witches
Between the 15th and 18th centuries, the fear of witchcraft became a weapon used to enforce male dominance over women. The most infamous text of this era, the Malleus Maleficarum or Hammer of Witches, was published in 1487 and served as a manual for identifying and destroying women. Heinrich Kramer, the author, argued that women were inherently more wicked than men, describing them as a necessary evil and a domestic danger. This text did not merely reflect the prejudices of the time; it actively fueled the persecution that followed. In early modern Europe and the colonies of North America, claims that witches were a threat to Christendom were used to justify the execution of thousands of women. The misogyny of the period played a central role in these trials, where women were accused of practicing witchcraft simply for being independent or for holding knowledge that threatened male authority. The legacy of these trials persists today. In Saudi Arabia, witchcraft remains illegal and punishable by death, with a woman being beheaded in 2011 for sorcery. In Tanzania, approximately 500 elderly women are murdered each year following accusations of witchcraft. These modern atrocities demonstrate how ancient fears, rooted in the belief that women are inherently dangerous, continue to shape violence against women in the 21st century.
The Legal Erasure Of Women
Until the 20th century, the law in many Western nations operated on the principle of coverture, a doctrine where a married woman's legal existence was suspended upon marriage. Under this system, the husband and wife were considered one person in law, and that person was the husband. Women were not legally defined as persons until 1875 in the United States, following the case Minor v. Happersett. This legal erasure meant that a woman could not own property, sign contracts, or keep her own earnings. Similar doctrines persisted in other parts of the world well into the modern era. In France, married women did not gain the right to work without their husband's permission until 1965. In West Germany, this right was not secured until 1977. During the Franco era in Spain, a married woman required her husband's consent, known as permiso marital, for employment, property ownership, and even travel. In Australia, until 1983, a married woman's passport application had to be authorized by her husband. These restrictions were not isolated incidents but part of a global pattern of treating women as property. In Yemen, marriage regulations still require a wife to obey her husband and not leave home without permission. In Iraq, the law allows husbands to legally punish their wives. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Family Code states that the husband is the head of the household, and a wife owes him obedience. These laws illustrate how legal systems have historically been designed to strip women of autonomy and enforce male control over every aspect of their lives.
Who coined the term sexism and when did it first appear in print?
Pauline M. Leet coined the term sexism on the 18th of November 1965 at Franklin and Marshall College. The word did not appear in print until 1968 when Caroline Bird delivered a speech titled On Being Born Female to the Episcopal Church Executive Council.
What historical text from 1487 fueled the persecution of women as witches?
The Malleus Maleficarum or Hammer of Witches was published in 1487 and served as a manual for identifying and destroying women. Heinrich Kramer wrote the text to argue that women were inherently more wicked than men and a necessary evil.
When did women gain the right to vote in New Zealand and when did Saudi Arabia grant women voting rights?
New Zealand became the first country to allow women to cast ballots in national elections in 1893. Saudi Arabia was the most recent country to extend the right to vote to women in 2011.
What percentage less do women earn than men according to the 2008 OECD report?
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development found that women earn 17% less than men on average in 2008. The female-to-male earnings ratio in the United States was 0.77 in 2009.
Which countries currently conscript women into their armed forces as of 2014?
Nine countries conscript women into their armed forces including China, Eritrea, Israel, Libya, Malaysia, North Korea, Norway, Peru, and Taiwan. Norway became the first NATO country to introduce obligatory military service for women in 2014.
The right to vote was not granted to women until 1893, when New Zealand became the first country to allow women to cast ballots in national elections. For centuries, women were excluded from the political process, with laws preventing them from voting or holding office. In ancient Rome, women could not participate in politics, and in ancient China, Confucian principles taught that a woman should obey her father in childhood, her husband in marriage, and her son in widowhood. The struggle for suffrage was long and arduous. Swiss women gained the right to vote in federal elections in 1971, and the canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden was forced to grant women the right to vote on local issues in 1991 by the Federal Supreme Court. French women were granted the right to vote in 1944, and Greek women in 1952. Liechtenstein did not allow women to vote until 1984. Even today, the most recent country to extend the right to vote to women was Saudi Arabia, which did so in 2011. Despite these legal victories, the political sphere remains heavily gendered. Studies show that in democracies like Australia, Canada, and the United States, women are still represented using gender stereotypes in the press. Female candidates are often judged on their appearance and personality rather than their policy positions, while male candidates are linked to issues like taxes and leadership. The ratio of women to men in legislatures remains a key measure of gender equality, yet the imbalance of lawmaking power continues to marginalize women's needs and perspectives.
The Wage Gap And The Glass Ceiling
In 2008, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development found that women still earn 17% less than men on average, despite having expanded employment rates. The gender pay gap is not merely a result of different choices but is driven by discrimination in the labor market. In the United States, the female-to-male earnings ratio was 0.77 in 2009, meaning female full-time, year-round workers earned 77% as much as their male counterparts. When the Equal Pay Act was passed in 1963, women earned only 48.9% as much as men. The gap has fluctuated over the decades but remains a persistent issue. In the European Union, the average gender pay gap was 27.5% in 2008. Research shows that even after accounting for factors like education and hours worked, a significant portion of the wage gap remains unexplained, attributed to gender discrimination. The glass ceiling effect further restricts women's advancement. In the United States, women make up 52% of the overall labor force but only three percent of corporate CEOs and top executives. This disparity is especially persistent for women of color, who face a concrete ceiling rather than a glass one. Studies indicate that mothers are less likely to be hired than equally qualified fathers and receive lower salaries if hired. The OECD found that a significant impact of children on women's pay is generally found in the United Kingdom and the United States. Fathers earn $7,500 more, on average, than men without children. The economic consequences of this discrimination are vast, with the unexplained portion of the wage gap attributed to gender discrimination accounting for a significant portion of the disparity.
The Objectification Of The Female Body
In social philosophy, objectification is the act of treating a person as an object or thing, denying their agency and autonomy. Martha Nussbaum identified several properties of objectification, including instrumentality, denial of autonomy, and reduction to body parts. This concept plays a central role in feminist theory, particularly regarding sexual objectification. In advertising, women are most often targets of sexism, shown in more feminine poses and with a higher degree of body display. Norway and Denmark have laws against sexual objectification in advertising, banning images that depict a woman in a bikini draped across a car. In Israel, billboards that depict sexual humiliation or abasement are banned. The fashion industry also contributes to this objectification, with thin models encouraging the development of bulimia and anorexia nervosa. The assignment of gender-specific baby clothes, such as pink for girls and blue for boys, instills negative gender stereotypes in children. In the garment industry, approximately 80 percent of workers are female, and they face sexual harassment, low wages, and discrimination when pregnant. The production process itself is often exploitative, with women in factories in Asia facing violence and abuse. The objectification of women extends to pornography, where Catharine MacKinnon and Andrea Dworkin argue that pornography reduces women to mere tools and contributes to violence against women. The debate over pornography continues, with defenders arguing that it does not seriously impact a mentally healthy individual, while opponents charge that it presents a distorted image of sexual relations and reinforces rape myths.
The Silence Of The Margins
Transgender people and gender nonconforming individuals face significant workplace discrimination and harassment. In June 2020, the United States Supreme Court ruled that federal civil rights law protects gay, lesbian, and transgender workers, with Justice Neil Gorsuch writing that an employer who fires an individual for being homosexual or transgender fires that person for traits or actions it would not have questioned in members of a different sex. However, the ruling did not protect LGBT employees from being fired based on their sexual orientation or gender identity in businesses of 15 workers or less. The 2008, 09 National Transgender Discrimination Survey showed that Black transgender people in the United States suffer the combination of anti-transgender bias and persistent, structural and individual racism. Black transgender people live in extreme poverty that is more than twice the rate for transgender people of all races and four times the general Black population rate. Gender nonconforming trans adults reported more events of major and everyday transphobic discrimination than their gender conforming counterparts. The concept of oppositional sexism, coined by Julia Serano, defines the belief that male and female are rigid, mutually exclusive categories. This belief normalizes masculine expression in males and feminine expression in females while simultaneously demonizing femininity in males and masculinity in females. The gender binary and oppositional norms work together to support traditional sexism, ensuring that those who are masculine have power over those who are feminine. The struggle for transgender rights is ongoing, with challenges to identity documents, sex-segregated public restrooms, and lack of access to appropriate health care services.
The Education And The Military
Women have traditionally had limited access to higher education, with studies showing that in the United States, women received only 21% of undergraduate degrees in computer and information science and 19% in engineering in 2008. Only one out of five of physics doctorates in the US are awarded to women, and only about half those women are American. Of all the physics professors in the country, only 14% are women. Educational specialties in higher education produce and perpetuate inequality between men and women. Conscription of only men in some countries has been criticized as discrimination against men. During the Modern era, prior to the late 20th century, mostly men were subjected to conscription, although there were several instances of conscription of women in Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Today, most countries still require only men to serve in the military. Only nine countries conscript women into their armed forces: China, Eritrea, Israel, Libya, Malaysia, North Korea, Norway, Peru, and Taiwan. In 2014, Norway became the first NATO country to introduce obligatory military service for women as an act of gender equality. Conditions in the military have been described as sexually abusive, with women in the military more likely to be raped by a male fellow soldier than killed by the enemy. The prosecution of reported crimes fails to move forward, as the Pentagon claimed it would undermine the leadership of the commanders. The gender selective draft has been challenged in the United States, with anthropologist Ayse Gül Altinay commenting that given equal suffrage rights, there is no other citizenship practice that differentiates as radically between men and women as compulsory male conscription.