In 19th century America, women were not treated with fairness and equality with men. The standard life of a woman basically was taking care of the house. This included cleaning, cooking, child support, and tidying up the garden or yard if the family did not have a slave. An illustration clearly demonstrates the role of woman in the 1800's accurately and inaccurately. The most inaccurate is how perfect everything looks, calm and chill as I like to say. But seriously, it's not even like this today and was so not like it back then. Three children plus a dog and this woman is standing there with looking all so serene when she should be multitasking. My female neighbor is more stressed than this, and she doesn't even have kid. However, the accurate parts of the picture speak for themselves. The books show it was the mother's job to educate the children. There are also toys in the back. There are only two because that's probably how many a family's child had. This family is an upper class family because they have furniture and non necessities that other middle class and poor families didn't have. Women were always under expectations set for them and that would lead to serious requests and demands.
It's very simple. If we were to go back in the 19th century and mention Women's rights, people would not have a good understanding of what we meant because they basically didn't have any rights at all. A good example is how husbands if they wanted to or had a terrible day at work could come home and beat their wives just to release stress and nothing would come of it. Change was needed. Laws and Practices were most of the laws for women. Women speaking in public was considered improper, and as I mentioned earlier, men using their wives a human punching bags was perfectly acceptable. Women also could not own property in the U.S.. It is a shame that it used to be that way. The Seneca Falls Convention basically pushed rights for women through. Voting was brought up and demanded. Abolitionists like Frederick Douglass, Elizabeth Stanton, and Susan Anthony attended and they realized working in the abolitionist movement made them much more aware of the rights they were never entitled to so they were able to go out and launch movements of equality and have credibility to it to have an effect. The Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions were basically what the name was, sentiments and resolutions to the problems from Laws and Practices.
Nationwide reactions to women's push for fairness and equality were quite different. Newspapers had daily articles on the reform movements. Responses were positive and negative. The Oneida Whig on August 1st, 1848 had a negative reaction to the reform movements. It basically said if women get certain rights that men have, then women will be like men and they don't want that. They don't want to be like us men.... A positive reaction to the push for reforms was the National Reformer which was published on August 10th, 1848. It states "They are women who know the wrongs as well as rights all human beings." and "They are composed largely, too, of working women--such as have felt their degradations and oppressions and are determined to throw them off." This newspaper unlike the Oneida Whig was supportive of the reform movements. With the reformers that I mentioned before buzzing and raising awareness and articles being published, people around the country were finally seeing what their country's reputation looked like and how it needed a change.
Today in this country, no matter where you are, who you are, you are treated as an equal to your perspective. However, you are not necessarily viewed as an equal. It is exactly like this for women. Women are still today separated from men by the general public. Now, differences among men and women are acceptable and unacceptable. For example, men and women using different bathrooms is completely 100% appropriate. Now, let's talk terms in jobs. If you heard Senator Elizabeth Warren's victory speech in 2012, she said that she would fight for lower taxes on middle class working families being crushed, big banks being more regulated and having less power, and then she said "< I can't believe I have to say this in 2012; equal pay for equal work for women." A personal experience would be for my mother. She is a marketing manager for an architectural environmental cleanup testing group. She does so much more work than some of her co workers and she gets paid less just because she is a woman. Another example we could use for today is for women in the media. I'll use sportscasters. If a man knows sports, he'll get the job easy just based on his knowledge of that media's coverage. For women, it all depends on their looks. They have to know the game but if it came down for a news program choosing between a man who knows sports and a woman who knows sports inside out and she was not necessarily good looking, the man would get the job. If it came down to deciding between two women whereas one knows sports inside out and isn't great looking and a woman who isn't as good sports knowledge wise but is gorgeous, the beauty queen will get the position just for her looks. A great example of views of men compared to views of women is in this video below. Take a look for yourself and see if you agree.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOjNcZvwjxI&feature=youtube
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