Feminist Jurisprudence

One thing I hate hearing is that all feminists are these hippie, bra burning, anti-men radicals and blame men for all of women's problems. I have taken several women studies classes and have learned a lot about feminism and what it actually is. If you believe that men and women should have equal rights then you are a feminist. There are many different kinds of feminism but the overall goal of most feminists is equal rights. Many people claim that men and women can never have completely equal rights. For example, many people say that its unfair for women to receive six weeks off from work for maternity leave. Most companies have equaled this by granting men paternity leave. In class today there was an argument about men not wanting paternity leave because they did not want to be look at negatively or have people think poorly of them. I don't see why anyone would think badly about a father taking time to care for his child. At the same time however, that person cannot expect to come back into work and immediately receive a raise. This would not be fair to the countless other employees who put in hard work for those six weeks. For whatever the reason was, that person missed work for an extended period of time. They should not be punished for this because raising a child is very important but they shouldn't be rewarded for missing work. My overall theme of this blog is that feminism has always had a negative connotation that it doesn't deserve. A very, very large portion of this nation believes in equal rights and that would make the majority of this country feminists. Weird huh?