Why Feminism Failed Women

In the late 1960’s, a group of twelve women, led by Kate Millet, sat around a table in New York City. Millet, known by many as the Female Marx, and a woman who would play a vital cog in the historic wheel of the larger Feminist movement, led the women in a chant.

“Why are we here today?”
“To make revolution,”
“What kind of revolution?”
“The Cultural Revolution.”
“And how do we make Cultural Revolution?”
“By destroying the American family!”
“How do we destroy the family?”
“By destroying the American Patriarch.”
“And how do we destroy the American Patriarch?”
“By taking away his power!”
“How do we do that?”
“By destroying monogamy!”
“How can we destroy monogamy?”

“By promoting promiscuity, eroticism, prostitution, abortion, and homosexuality!”
To the average reader, these words likely sound radical and extreme. Destroying the American family? Destroying monogamy? Promoting promiscuity, eroticism, prostitution, abortion, and homosexuality? Certainly, these ideas must represent some form of extremism within the larger feminist movement, and cannot constitute the central roots of Feminism, right?

Wrong!

To most Americans, the word “Feminism” represents a very important historic movement that has fought for equal rights for women; a movement that shined a bright light on many abuses that women—as the naturally more vulnerable of the two genders—have experienced throughout history. On the one hand, Christians can legitimately celebrate actual abuse that has been exposed and stories that have been told. However, this “exposure” is not the central thread of Feminism, and to pretend that it is, is to simply ignore the recorded history of the movement.

My aim in this post is to truly bless our women. I believe the Bible paints a picture of godly womanhood that is so profound and wonderful, that it truly pains me to see the toxic femininity that is so often sold to our ladies from every corner of our culture. Many of the ideas that are simply commonplace in our society today, are in fact rooted in quite sinister places. It is my aim to free us from the shackles of society’s vision of the good life, and to point us towards that which truly is the good life! As Psalm 34:8 so poignantly says, “O taste and see that the Lord is good!”

The Earliest Roots of Feminism
Feminism, from its earliest days was built around a few key ideas, some of which are very well described in the quote above. I highly recommend the book End of Woman: How Smashing the Patriarchy Has Destroyed Us by Carrie Gress for a deeper dive on these ideas. I will walk through four of those ideas below.

Free Love: From its earliest days, Feminist leaders were advocates of “Free Love,” the idea that each man and woman should be free to have sexual relations with any other person at any other time, without any strings attached. The “free love” movement was born in the 19th century but blossomed within the Hippie movement of the 60’s. From Mary Wollstonecraft (the supposed Mother of Feminism) up through modern day leading Feminists, free love has always been a central component and anthem. The biblically defined vision of sexuality as given by God through the Scriptures, of sex designed for one man and woman within the covenant of marriage, was considered an oppressive institutional relic that had to be expunged if women were to ever truly be free from men’s sexual dominance. This sentiment is described well in Kate Millet’s description above of how to “destroy monogamy.”

Family and Motherhood Bad & Abortion Good: Secondly, within Feminism, motherhood was always considered a major vulnerability for women. Rather than seeing motherhood as the Scriptures understand it, a beautiful gift that elevates the glory of women, Feminism saw motherhood as a great vulnerability that deepened a woman’s inferiority to men in the home, in society, and in the workplace. Likewise, they even saw the family structure, of a husband and a wife with different roles and duties towards one another, as a primary symbol of all that needed to be overthrown. As a result, abortion immediately became the sacrament of the Feminist movement that must be protected at all costs. Abortion was the great tool that would allow women to practice “free love” while not becoming mothers. To this day, when one listens to Feminists, it is easy to hear not only the need for abortion, but the celebration of abortion as a good to society that has liberated women. As a side, it is an interesting study to read some of the earliest Feminist writers struggle so deeply with their internal maternal wirings. It’s almost as if, while fighting to end the cycles of motherhood that they believed so confined women, they could not escape some natural internal wiring to love and nurture the children around them.

Christianity as the Great Oppressor: Third, from the earliest days, Christianity was always seen as the great institution of male hierarchy, and therefore the great institution that had to be overturned in order to truly liberate women. As early as the late 1700s, the founding Feminist leaders were reimagining the Genesis story in order to create a new creation-myth to substantiate their movement. In their retelling of Genesis 1-3, God is the great villain who desired to confine Adam and Eve. Satan, on the other hand, was viewed as the great liberator who dared to suggest that we were able to defy God’s design. And Eve, was the heroine of the story, the woman who dared to fight back against God, defy his law, and eat what had been forbidden. Even today, feminist leaders regularly attack Christianity as “patriarchal” and oppressive towards women.

The Occult: Lastly, and perhaps unknown to most, Feminism has been rooted and sustained by the occult. Whether it was Elizabeth Stanton’s engagement with Theosophy or Victoria Woodhull’s Spiritualism, or many other examples. Many of the leading Feminists overtly wrote about their communication with spirits. Elizabeth Stanton, for example, practiced a form of witchcraft using “spirit tables” in which she would tap on a table and hear tappings in return from spirits. One of her “spirit tables” is actually still on display in the Smithsonian today. The famous American railroad tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt, actually sought out Victoria Woodhull when trying to figure out how to make his fortune, because she was so well known as one who could speak with the spirits. Indeed, by following the spirit’s instructions, Vanderbilt became the tycoon we know him as today. In fact, early on in Feminism, the occult became a way for women who functioned essentially as mediums and witches, to overthrow the Christian hegemony and establish their own religion with women at the head.

Some Reflections
What can we say to all this? I think it is perhaps most important that we acknowledge the beauty of Biblical womanhood. While Feminism has attempted from the beginning to remove the divisions between men and women, the Bible has always celebrated those differences as beautiful and good. God did not give Adam another Adam. He gave Adam an Eve, a counterpart with a different body and different wiring altogether. These differences are part of the beauty of God’s design.

While Feminism has viewed motherhood as something less, the Bible has always championed motherhood as something miraculous, as something that ought to be protected and defended.

While Feminism has torn down monogamy in its pursuit of free love, the Bible established the safety net of the covenant of marriage to protect the sacredness of sex. “Free love” as it turns out, isn’t so free. It is devastatingly costly physically, mentally, and spiritually. It is only within the monogamous covenant of marriage that each partner in a sexual relationship can be fully vulnerable and yet fully loved. God’s design is good.

While Feminism has championed abortion, a practice that takes the life of the most vulnerable among us, those in the womb, Christianity has championed care for the vulnerable, and forgiveness of sin and new life in Christ for the mother and father.
While Feminism has sought the occult to lead the movement in some kind of spirituality, true Spirituality can only be found through Jesus Christ. He is the way, the truth and the life. And all other false forms of spirituality only lead to heartache, regret, and death.

The Biblical vision of womanhood is beautiful. It honors women as women, without trying to make them men. In the Scriptures we meet all kinds of women, young and old, single, married, divorced, and widowed, all with plenty to teach us about what it means to follow God faithfully. The Scriptures, far from the caricature often painted, radically lift women up to a place of mutual image-bearing alongside men, and assign women with a critical place in the Kingdom of God. The Scriptures paint a vivid picture of godly femininity that champions historic virtues like inner beauty, faithfulness to God and family, nurturing motherhood, modesty and purity, and loving care for the needy. Feminism has quite literally tried to destroy the very things that will most bring out the fulness of all that God has designed for women to be.

O might we restore a vision for Biblical womanhood! Taste and see that the Lord, and his vision for life, for meaning, for marriage, for manhood and womanhood, is good!