Women went back to working at home and jobs were taken over by men again. They say that World War One did very little to change the position of women in Britain. The truth is that World War One did change the lives of women but the extent was limited and their role in society was never the same as it had been before 1914. It is important to remember that if it wasn’t for their protest and demonstration before, women’s rights wouldn’t have been on the agenda of the government and change would have taken much longer. With so many young men enlisted in the army, the role women played was crucial, not only to the war
Women wanted the same working rights as men, and they fought hard for it. Suffragettes stoped their campaign of violence and supported the government and its war effort in every way. The work done by women in the First World War was to be vital for Britain's war effort. Even though women gained the right to vote shortly after the war, its argued that the war wasn’t really the cause of giving women this right. After all, in countries such as New Zealand (1893), Australia (1901), Finland (1906) or Norway (1913) women got the vote before the war began, whereas others such as Denmark (1915), Iceland (1915), Holland (1917) or Sweden (1919) gave it to women during the war without being involved in it.
Is feminism still relevant in the modern world? In the early 20th century the suffragettes played a huge part in gaining votes for women. World War One also played a large part the feminist movement as women who had previously been deemed incapable of much more than looking after children and husbands were now required to help in other areas such as the work force as part of the war effort. After World War One women were not content to revert back to their pre-war status. World War Two required women in the munitions factories and as land girls which due to the shortage of men gave, women a definite place in the working environment, and the argument of women being incapable was now of no consequence.
Although women traditionally were excluded from military service and their participation in the Armed Forces was not promoted at the outset of World War II, it soon became apparent that their participation was necessary to win a total war. “ (Women in the Millitary in World War II) As a result, women played an important role in the World War II and they had a great duty to save the world and protect their countries. During World War II, the generally held belief in the United State was that women were incapacitated for several days each month and were accident-prone prior to and during the menses. But those who rebut the woman's body as military liability claims argue that menstruation does not incapacitate or debilitate most women and that "female military nurses have had
Why were women given the vote in 1918? In 1918, women had finally gained the right to vote, after 68 long and hard years of campaigning and rebelling they finally got the vote they wanted. The women had tried everything like campaigning, getting them selves arrested, using the media and many more things were done. However, there were a couple of things that they did which really helped them get the right to vote and they were the fact that they helped the men in World War I, like loading the bombs shells with explosives and tidying the bomb shelters. Also I thought that the Suffragists played a vital role in getting the rights for women to vote because they proved to the men that they could protest and campaign without using violence or breaking the law, unlike the Suffragettes, who resorted to violence when they wanted their way or when they wanted to be heard.
As soon as the war broke out, the women of Britain suspended their campaign for the franchise, and boosted recruitment among the country. For example, suffragists with their publicity machine, worked to persuade young men to join the army. Meanwhile, some women’s organizations, such as Mothers’ Union and the Active Service League also tried to encourage men to join the army. One method consisted of giving out white feathers that symbolized cowardice to those men not enlisted. (Walsh,76) The war also posed serious problems to the British economy and labor industry.
Women were able, furthermore, to stand as candidates in local elections by 1888, enabling women to challenge opposition views that had always denied them their rights, and the increasing roles of women in society indicated greater social acceptance. However, limitations persisted in that these responsibilities were seen as ‘domestic’ and women were still openly denied the parliamentary franchise. In addition, these crucial changes remained restricted to only middle class women, thus losing crucial support from working class women who had already established highly developed unions. Hence, the Radical Suffragist Party focused on working class women thus ‘radical’ for these views. These contributed to social reform through peaceful means and set up successful women’s trade unions which created equal rights for women in payment and working hours.
Using my own research i will discover whether the World War One had a positive effect on the role of women. After the immediate rise in female unemployment at the beginning of the war due to the ‘middle-classes wish to economise’ (first world war, accessed 07/01/09), the only option to replace the volunteers gone to front was to employ women in the jobs they had left behind. This was supported by all the major feminist groups, who suddenly ‘became avid patriots and organisers of the women in support of the war effort’ (war and gender, accessed 22/01/09). Overall women’s employment increased from ‘three million in 1914 to five million in 1918’ (Murphy, p373, 2000). For many of the women the war was ‘a genuinely liberating experience’ (first world war, accessed 07/01/09), and made the women feel useful as citizens.
The Nazi’s were fixed on the idea that a woman’s role was at home, being a mother and a wife. They wanted women to have plenty of children so the birth rates would go up and Germany could form a large army and become a more powerful nation. Working class women were removed from factories and encouraged to stay at home, and middle class women were removed from their professions. They were urged to wear traditional clothing, and behave in a much less liberal way than was allowed during Weimar times. Many middle class women were unhappy about this, and after the freedoms and empowerment of women during Weimar they did not like the new constrictions – it seemed almost like a step back for them.
Before 1918, women in Britain were not enfranchised to the vote on an equal status with men, though; they often worked for a living and paid taxes, just like men. I chose to talk about suffragettes and suffragists in the period of 1905 – 1914 firstly because as a woman I am related to it, and I am telling myself that, if these women did not exist and did not accomplish all they accomplished in that period, I may not be able to vote today, and for me the right to vote is something very important, especially when you know what did women in order to obtain it. I also chose this topic because I consider that the suffrage for women was a kind of revolution, a breaking up with the norms and traditions, and a big step for society at that time. Two principal organisations distinguished themselves in that period: The National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS, called the suffragists) and the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU, also called the suffragettes). These two organisations had the same aims (vote for women and equal rights with men), but were quite different.