Posted: Wed Oct 14, 2009 11:55 pm Post subject: Reading pp. 21-39 (First Half Ch. 2) in Dicker
How was the early suffrage movement inspired by or connected to other movements -- abolition and temperance specifically? Did these connections impact early suffrage? How?
(When you respond, please end your post with a new question -- you can respond to this focusing question or a question asked by one of your peers.)
Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 4:51 am Post subject: Assignment 2
How was the early suffrage movement inspired by or connected to other movements -- abolition and temperance specifically? Did these connections impact early suffrage?
The early suffrage movement was connected with abolitionist movements, and with temperance. Many sufferaget women worked in the abolition movement as well because of the similarities between the two groups. Some did not, however because they thought that working with both groups would diminish the importance of the suffrage movement.
On the subject of temperance: many women tried to close down bars, and make drinking illegal for a couple of different reasons. When some men got drunk, they regularly gambled away the household money, and/or beat their wives. Because of this, women felt that it was necissary to prevent this behavior.
Some women on the other hand, felt that they would have a more difficult time winning the right to vote if they supported temperance. This is because the ones who would ultimately make the decision as to whether or not they got to vote, wouldn't want women's oppinions to be counted against drinking- an activity which they might have enjoyed.
I think that these connections had a huge effect on women's suffrage. In my oppinion, if many groups work together towards similar things in the same time period, they are more likely to be listened to by the general public, and therefore the government as well. As they say,
"power in numbers."
Going off what Liza said, I agree that abolitionist movements and temperance movements greatly influenced women’s suffrage in that these original movements taught women how to fight for what they believed in. The anti-slavery movement was very similar to suffrage. One quote from the book said “All through the Anti-Slavery struggle, every word of denunciation of the wrongs of the Southern slave, was, I felt, equally applicable to the wrongs of my own sex. Every argument for the emancipation of the colored man, was equally one for that of women”( 28 ). Because slave’s struggles were so similar to women’s struggles, women who got involved in abolition began to realize that they were being treated just as horribly as slaves, and in fighting for anti-slavery, they learned all about organizing protests and getting their voices heard, which helped them when they began to fight for women’s rights.
I thought it was really interesting when the book talked about Sojourner Truth, and how when she spoke at the women’s rights convention, at first the women there were not willing to listen to Truth because they thought she was going to talk about slavery. But instead Truth talked about how being black over-rode her identity as a woman. I think what Truth was trying to say was that this was a feminist issue; the fact that just because she was black, she was not seen as a woman. This combined both race and women issues, and I think what she was saying is a really important. It ties into some of what we read in the book yesterday, like how feminism isn’t just about equality with men, but also racial and class equality.
Question:
What do you think Sojourner Truth meant with her whole "Ain't i a woman?" speech?
Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 6:32 am Post subject: Answer to the question
I think that the early suffrage connected to other movements was that it inspired other women to create groups or speeches like the Declaration of Sentiments which was created by Elizabeth Cady Stanton which is what Rachel and Liza kind of said after I read it. Also to the subject of anti-slavery, I also agree with Rachel that it was similar to the other movements and that's when the other groups like Manhattan Abolition Society and Colored People Anti-Slavery Society. I like when they mentioned that the main topics they discussed were liberty, justice,and equality.
To kind of answer Rachel's question, I thought it meant that she was telling the other men that she is different from them and she is more sensitive but she isn't an inanimate object but she also has some sort of power, i guess. That's how I saw it.
I believe that the similarities between the suffrage and other movement are pretty evident. And it is because of the similarities that one lent to the other. It is one of the most simplest ideas, that similar parties, fighting for the same thing should have sympathy for the other. Though the two are similar, there was initial discontempt, I do not really know whether this was truly because, as Dicker put it that women were worried about the fact that one would detract from the other, but the fact that within humans there is always a want to be better than another group. This is something I have noticed in almost everysingle history class ever. There is an initial distrust or dislike for the other that quickly turns to amiability with the realization that one directly depends on the other and that in order to accomplish one goal, the other must be accomplished simulataneously. I think this also relates to my favorite quote that I know forget about politics and personal. Either way I think it relates in some way that I cannot really pinpoint.
So i guess that lends to my question, how do the personal lives, and political agendas of the suffrage and abolitionist move intersect, connect or diverge from one another?
So in response to what has already been said, I do agree with most of the points that have been made. I think it is important that Jenny used the word "inspired" when she referred to the relationship between the first wave women's movement and other movements and groups of activists at the time.
Women of this time period had been living beneath the men in their lives for so long that it took the action against other inequalities for them to realize the injustices that they were suffering. The idea of what a woman was suppose to be was cemented in society so much that women were not seen as leaders and did not see themselves as leaders either. Dicker refers to the "cult of domesticity", or this code that women were to adhere to, as only including such things like skill as a homemaker, religious devotion, sexual purity, and willingness to defer to men. If these were the things that a woman's character was judged by, then she would certainly have no reason to assert the rights of others, let alone her own rights as a woman and prominent member of society.
It was the involvement in activism for various other causes that inspired women to raise awareness for inequality. These other causes such as anti-slavery taught women about basic human rights. Women realized the severity of the injustice that they were enduring because they sympathized with those people who they were fighting in causes for.
Question:
I was confused by the logic that women could not be leaders during this time period. At one point there is a quote in the reading that says that for a women to assume a position of power is "unnatural" (I'm paraphrasing) but, how can this be unnatural? One of the aspects of the "cult of domesticity" is to be a homemaker, and/or a mother, right? And don't these things require a level of leadership? Maybe it's a lame question, but it was on my mind when I was reading about all of these women being told that they couldn't be leaders because it was "unnatural".
Women movement could not have been successful if advocated alone. It was tightly connected to other major movements: temperance and abolition. In my point of view, the cooperation of feminism with abolition was very necessary while that with temperance was less so.
Women supported temperance because "It seemed like a natural cause for women - after all, under the influence of alcohol, men could squander an entire paycheck and, worse, physically abuse their wives and children". However, there are a lot of men who, without alcohol, still severely abuse their children and wives. Prohibiting acohol seemed to be a superficial answer to an intricate question. The root of the problem, indeed, lied in both men and women. It has become a rule of oppression and tyranny: the tolerance of the oppressed facilitates the oppression.
On the subject of abolition, like Dicker said, one could not solve the problem on sexism while disregarding racism. Sojourner Truth's question "And ain't I a woman?" was the key to success of teh cooperation of feminism and abolition.
Hi it's Abby! Here's what I wrote after reading the text last night.
Though all women were oppressed by men and deprived of their rights at this time in history, there was still a distinct racial divide between them. Though white women did not receive great job opportunities, they were certainly greater than those that were available to black women, which was simply the jobs of domestic labor. Black women were still held under slavery, and not considered equal to whites.
Another opportunity that was far easier to come by as a white woman was the ability to fight against slavery. One of the primary motivators for women to abolish slavery was their religion. Because religion was of great importance to many women, and they saw that slavery was in violation of their beliefs, they came together in organization such as the Boston's Female Anti-Slavery society. But even though this organization was fighting for the end of slavery and eventually, integration between whites and blacks, the organization did not include black women, and so they formed their own organization, the Colored Female's Anti Slavery Society. I found it interesting that although both these societies were fighting to end slavery and racism that they did not feel that they could come together. I also found it interesting that the white women's organization simply called themselves "Female Anti-Slavery Societies," which is a name that applies to every woman fighting slavery, black or white, while the colored women had to specify themselves as a "Colored Female's" society.
Throughout the reading I saw that the coalition between suffrage groups as a way to strengthen their numbers. All of these groups were the minorities, being suppresses by the majority. By various different suffrage movements 'teaming up' they were able to minimize the gap between the majority and the minorities. Being able to work together to make their voices be heard. Equality for all PEOPLE not equality for a race, a gender, or a religion.
Why did white women eventually move away from other movements? Because they didn't believe in their message? Or because others didn't? Or both?
The cables suggest Yemen's president insisted on taking responsibility for US air strikes
Continue reading the main story
Wikileaks Revelations
Cables at a glance
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Has Wikileaks cost lives?
Bumpy ride ahead for US diplomats
US cables released by the Wikileaks website suggest that Yemen allowed secret US air strikes against suspected al-Qaeda militants.
President Ali Abdullah Saleh claimed raids were conducted by Yemen's military when they were in fact carried out by the US, according to the cables.
The files also reveal that Mr Saleh rejected an offer to deploy US ground forces in Yemen.
The US fears Yemen has become a haven for al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
The cables detail how Mr Saleh claimed responsibility for two US air strikes in December 2009, according to the Guardian .
A few days after the second attack on 24 December, Mr Saleh told the then head of US central command, General David Petraeus: "We'll continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours."
On 21 December, US ambassador Stephen Seche reported in a dispatch that "Yemen insisted it must 'maintain the status quo' regarding the official denial of US involvement."
Mr Seche quotes Mr Saleh as saying that he wanted operations to continue "non-stop until we eradicate this disease".
The messages are among more than 250,000 US cables obtained by the whistle-blowing website Wikileaks.
The files are released in stages by Wikileaks, and details are also being published in the Guardian, the New York Times and other papers around the world that investigated the material.
'Bizarre'
According to the files released on Friday, Gen Petraeus had flown in to Yemen's capital Sanaa to tell Mr Saleh that the US would also allow its ground forces to be deployed in Yemen on counter-terrorism operations.
Mr Saleh rejected the offer, although he had told President Barack Obama's national security adviser, John Brennan, in September 2009 that he would give the US full access.
"I have given you an open door on terrorism," Mr Saleh is quoted in a US cable after the meeting with Mr Brennan.
Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is suspected of having launched a number of attacks on targets in the West, including failed plots to bomb several cargo airliners in October.
The cables also reveal Mr Saleh to be an erratic partner in negotiations, the Guardian reports.
US security officials who met Yemen's long-standing leader in the course of 2009 described him as "petulant" and "bizarre".
After one meeting with Mr Brennan, the US ambassador reported that Mr Saleh had been "in vintage form". Mr Seche wrote that the President was "at times disdainful and dismissive", while he was "conciliatory and congenial" on other occasions.
Mr Saleh told Mr Brennan that should the US not help Yemen, "this country will become worse than Somalia".
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