Feminism has never had an easy ride. Only last week, a WI group in Nottinghamshire issued an apology to a mother who claims she was not welcome to breastfeed her baby at meetings, because many of the group wanted to keep it a child-free zone.
At the same time, both men and women have criticised education secretary Nicky Morgan for her plans to drop feminism from the A-level politics syllabus.
So is it a case of women standing together, or is it more complicated than that? Here are some of the positive recommendations for improved gender equality that came out of a Guardian/National Theatre debate chaired by Jane Garvey.
The panel comprised the Guardian’s Kira Cochrane, women’s rights activist Nimko Ali, student, blogger and campaigner June Eric- Udorie, columnist Julia Hartley-Brewer, screenwriter Abi Morgan and the leader of the Women’s Equality Party Sophie Walker,
1) Reclaim the f word
Hartley-Brewer: I’m always stunned by the amount of people who wouldn’t describe themselves as a feminist. It’s very simple: do you think that men and women should be treated equally? There’s nothing complicated, there’s nothing controversial and any pretty sensible person should be a feminist and should be proud.
Walker: The anti-feminists did a good job of rebranding feminists as being man-hating lunatics … then men in business and politics roundly failed to lean in. Feminism is having a fantastic relaunch.
Eric-Udorie: It’s important for women to feel that they can claim that word, and not feel that being a feminist means you burn your bra. As Caitlin Moran says it’s ridiculous; why would I burn my bra? I love my bra.
2) Embrace the many different voices of feminism
Eric-Udorie: For any sort of movement to be successful I don’t think we should sideline any woman, especially now with the internet, there is the space for different voices and opinions. As a movement we have to work together – women of different races, backgrounds. We do need to come together.
Morgan: It’s about calibrating to say: there’s intersectionality in feminism. We’ve got to talk about what it means to be a disabled feminist? What it means to be a black feminist? What it means to be a gay feminist? We may be united in the fact we are all trying to strive for equality but there are differences.
3) Take action: create, campaign, dismantle
Eric-Udorie: It’s not about what you call yourself. If you are actively trying to work on equality it’s your actions that matter.
Cochrane: What I’d love to do is get out there and make something. The Suffragettes got out there and made a campaign. You see that again with women today. It’s so exciting. Someone like Laura Bates who founded the Everyday Sexism Project or Lucy Anne-Holmes who started No More Page 3 – they didn’t even call themselves feminists before they started these campaigns, they just saw a problem and they just got out there and made something. I’m excited about people making things.
Walker: We have to dismantle the structures; the structured sexism of our society. There’s a shorthand we fall into that women must do ‘this’ and men must do ‘this’ and actually it’s about finding space to allow people to ‘be’.
4) Talk to your politician
Eric-Udorie: If there’s any group that’s completely ignored by the government, especially the current government, it’s young people. There needs to be more young women going into politics but they’re just being completely turned off [by] old white men shouting.
Walker: Women are 51% of the population – a hugely broad and diverse range of people, and [politicians] need to be taking that into account and offering policies for us. There are an awful lot of older women joining our party because they are sick of being invisible.
5) Support each other
Morgan: It’s about leaning in and saying “I’m going to send the elevator down and I’m going to come with it and make sure you get up to the top floor with me”. It’s about having a longer term view and a longer term commitment.
Walker: Women are working really well together. A lot of the stuff we’re doing now is really practical: how do we change this, what does our experience tell us about what works, how do we do it?
Ali: It’s easy to criticise and not congratulate. We don’t talk about how much solidarity there is.
This debate took place on 10 December at the National Theatre in London. To find out what other events are coming up sign up to become a Guardian Member.
