Feminist Vs Equalist

In my view, the “equalist approach” is a step ahead than the feminist approach. The end goals of both the approaches are same but one is a stepping stone to reach another.

There are several of my friends both – guys and girls who are anti-feminists but still believe in equality, and they do not come to terms believing that feminism is nothing but equality. I was  introduced to this subject called – Gender and Development during my graduation and post-graduation as a student of Development Communication and Extension. I am glad for getting the opportunity to study this as the subject. It has quite convinced me how almost every woman in the world is getting oppressed. They are oppressed so vigilantly that they are not even able to identify their oppression because that’s how deep rooted patriarchy is in the world.

I became a feminist because I studied gender, understood feminism and am learning each day about it. But this isn’t the case with my friends who label themselves as equalists, because they have not read about it. Patriarchy has been able to normalize the oppression and some of them stand out and bring this concept of “equalists” because they don’t want the victims to realize the oppression. After all, patriarchy is all about holding power. They want to foster the already existing power relations around the world.

Feminism leads the way

An equalist and feminist are two different levels of a system, since equity is the way to equality. So the women who say I don’t want reservation in a bus,  a separate coach in a metro its because they are privileged and what they are failing to understand is that everyone is not as privileged. Providing reservation for  disadvantaged sections is referred to as affirmative action. Its the way  to establish equality , equally distribute the power and break the existing power-biases in our society.

In my view, the “equalist approach” is a step ahead than the feminist approach. The end goals of both the approaches are same but one is a stepping stone to reach another. The feminist- approach asks for affirmative actions in order to bring equality and there by establishing an equalist approach in our society.

To bring and establish more empathy in the equalists we need to introduce gender as a compulsory subject in the education system. We need to sensitize our youth irrespective of  gender so that they understand the importance of – why even someone is getting any reservation? Rather than just snapping at someone who is using reservation.

First published here.

Image source: Unsplash

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