THE MANY WAVES OF FEMINISM
As we’ve explained, feminism didn’t just come about all at once. It came in ripples, much like finger curls gracefully draped across time. In other words, it came in waves.
Whether they’re beach waves, hair waves, or feminist waves, we fucking love waves. So we did a ton of research on feminist waves and discovered that each era had its own style and attitude. Much like New Wave or deciding to wave or not wave at your coworkers outside of work, many women had different ideas about what feminism meant to them, and sometimes it got contentious. For example, many women still wonder today if the five different Spice Girls really did represent all women. Fortunately we resolved that question years ago,* so now we can focus on more important questions like, “Will unlikely animal friendships end racism?” and “Is beach hair inclusive?”
Of course, there is no way you will ever win at feminism without knowing how each wave of feminism came to pass. And although women throughout history have made lil’ feminist steps like winning the right to vote and own property, it’s not a cohesive movement until cute catchphrases and songs become associated with the changes. These are what help us to really understand what feminism is about in this very moment. After years of research and also just kind of guessing, here are the waves of modern feminism.
THE WAVES OF FEMINISM: TIMELINE
0–1939: No Idea
Pass!
1939–1945: The “We Can Do It!” Wave
When Rosie the Riveter took a selfie and captioned it “We Can Do It!” she literally broke whatever was around before the Internet. Finally, we had a woman with a catchphrase and a dope outfit that celebrated us, which started the “We Can Do It!” wave of feminism. The “We Can Do It!” wave was steadfast in reminding American women that not only can we do it; we can look hella good doing it, too.
Unfortunately, while a lot of women thought Rosie’s “it” meant “we can do anything we set our minds to,” a lot of men thought it meant “we can do more work on top of our existing housework.” All of this actually made it a pretty stressful time to be a woman. This period brought us an age of killer blue rompers and permission to touch the weights at the gym, but we women soon realized we needed a better solution to gain equality.
Later on, the birth of the first female superhero, Wonder Woman, gave rise to the belief that not only could women fight evil, but they could do it all in a killer outfit while showing off some major cleave. This unfortunately caused a lot of women to immediately feel bad about their newly purchased romper-and-handkerchief getup and get motivated to start making newer and better strides in how good women could look.
1960–1970: Mad Men, We Guess
This is the wave where your mom did stuff in an office, also known as the Mad Men wave of feminism. Some complicated shit went down somewhere between civil rights and the Vietnam War. Fortunately, most of it can be figured out by watching Mad Men, asking your mom what happened, or just asking your mom what happened on Mad Men.
1970–1995: Shoulder Pads and Bangs!
This was when strong women like Mary Tyler Moore, Laverne and Shirley, and Murphy Brown entered the workforce, and the real world has never been the same since. Not only were they the first women to ever be in skilled leadership professions; they skillfully demonstrated the rise and fall of shoulder pads. These brave women showed us that women can do any job a man can do, just as long as she skips to that job while singing or throwing her garments into the air. Also, Murphy Brown showed us that you can have a baby even if you aren’t married—talk about DIY!!! These women are real women and not just characters, so if any of them are reading this book, we thank them for kicking feminism up a notch!!!
WHAT DID YOUR MOM DO BEFORE FEMINISM?
“I was fired from my first job for not being ‘attractive enough’ to be a secretary. Thirty years later, I watched one episode of Mad Men and realized why.”
“My family forced me to give up the baby I had out of wedlock. A few decades later, Mad Men came out, and I realized I should have been focusing on my career all along!”
“Would you look at that Jon Hamm? He’s so handsome. Is he single? What a cute butt! Can’t you just send him an e-mail or something? I’m dying soon.”
1995–2001: “Girl Power!”
This was the wave of feminism that changed feminism forever. “Girl Power!” was the battle cry of the tiny pink spaghetti-strap tops of our youth, and the message was clear: no matter what challenges we faced in modern society, we ruled, and that was that. The Spice Girls came up with this pivotal phrase out of the blue one day, just hanging out together like the best friends forever that they have always been. Plenty of girls already believed that they ruled,* but a lot of them lacked the actual power to carry it out in their daily lives. When the Spice Girls uttered the phrase, “Girl Power!” with their strong, diverse girl fists in the air, the world changed overnight.
Now, not only could we yell about how we can “do it”; we could yell about power, which was a huge change from what the previous generations were yelling. Finally, the world would know what we wanted, what we really, really wanted.
2009–2013: “Who Run the World? Girls!”
The women’s movement made major strides in this era, where we went from being full-time baby ovens to literally running the world. Now, with Beyoncé as our figurehead and Michelle Obama as our arms, there was literally no stopping us (girls) from running shit.
Several more feminist issues were left unresolved during this era like, “Can women play video games?” and “Can women wake up . . . like this?” but fortunately these questions would be resolved in the coming wave of feminism.
2014: “I Woke Up Like This”
Sure, we run the world, but many begged the question, “How did we wake up?” And the answer was right in front of us. “Women of the world, you woke up,” Beyoncé said, “like this.” Whatever this was, women woke up that way, and there was literally no stopping us from doing it. This not only affirmed our power over the world, but declared that, like Beyoncé, we all naturally wake up looking like goddesses, even before our vitamin B-12 gummy or pits-only shower. We finally took back the A.M. Whose morning? Our morning!
2015–present: “YAAAS QUEEN”
Started by one of our drag-queen sisters, YAAAS QUEEN is an inclusive phrase of affirmation of one’s looks or behavior, that set the stage for the next big wave in feminism. The long-term effects and changes of YAAAS QUEEN are yet to be examined, but they seem to champion the looks and works of women who are not Beyoncé.
And there you have it: the long, slow arc of feminist history. Whether you’re a feminist or just a woman interested in looking at feminism, it’s important to understand what our foremothers did to shape the feminist world we enjoy today, one brave wave at a time.
CELEBS ON BEING FEMINIST
Some of our favorite female celebrities are jumping on the feminist bandwagon. You heard it here