According to history teacher Carley Kregness, the early feminist movements focused on women’s right to vote.

“First-wave feminism, as we call it now, officially started in 1848 with the Seneca Falls movement,” Kregness said.“It had leaders like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Elizabeth Blackwell and Susan B. Anthony. The goals of the first wave of feminism were ultimately suffrage.”

Michelle Witte, Executive Director of the League of Women’s Voters Minnesota, said women’s involvement in the World War One effort catalyzed the growth of feminist movements.

“What was changing was World War One. Women became part of the workforce and part of the military complex,” Witte said. “They were nurses and played all kinds of jobs in the war. That was significant because people hadn’t had this construct of women in that space.”

History teacher Scott Miller said the societal expectations that are put on women were challenged by feminist movements, helping spark support for other women’s issues.

“(Women) are expected to go home and raise a family and (because of that) we see this push for more equality of choice,” Scott Miller said. “Then out of that morphs a lot of (other) things like equal pay, reproductive rights, divorce rights and custody issues. That is all of a sudden going to become part of this movement to try to have more of an equal society.”

According to Kregness, the term “feminist” was coined during second-wave feminism. She said second-wave feminism had many more goals and focused on social issues women faced, as well as equality in the law.

“Second-wave feminism officially started in 1968. But actually, it was built throughout the whole 1960s. Even from the early fifties. It is what people called and recognized (as) the “feminist movement,” Kregness said. “(Second-wave feminism) is definitely about equality in the law, in pay, in jobs, in treatment, no sexual discrimination, that sort of thing. The way this movement focused on social issues, a lot of it was more about sex, sexual discrimination and objectification of women.”

Senior Isaiah Brown said women’s roles in the workforce during World War II (WWII) was a catalyst for second-wave feminism and women’s rights in the workforce.

“Second-wave feminism was about workers’ rights because (During WWII), many men had gone off to war and they gave a lot of jobs to women,” Brown said. “After the war when (the soldiers) came back, they’re like ‘okay, give us our jobs back’ and women were like, ‘wait a minute, we did this damn near as good as you did.’ They wanted (more) rights.”

Witte said second-wave feminism propelled many other civil rights movements. She said it helped bring more women into public offices.

“The second wave of feminism was this era where women were seeing their potential, but also there was this full potential for looking ahead at rights, not just (for women) but for everyone,” Witte said. “It’s interesting to watch—starting in 1972, the number of women who started running for office suddenly went off the charts so it was a pivotal time.”

The current wave of feminism is said by experts to have started in the 1990s. Kregness said the new wave of feminism is about racial, ethnic and class diversity in feminist spaces that formerly excluded minorities.

“The third wave is more when women start talking about intersectionality, (and) where women of color become much more integrated into the movement,” Kregness said. “Instead of it being such a white middle-class driven movement, in third-wave feminism, there’s more multi-class, more multiracial, multi-ethnic involvement in the movement.”

Co-president of Park Girls United, senior Sela Myers said she has noticed an increase in intentions to include more diverse perspectives in feminist spaces.

“Feminism has been focused on just supporting white women and that’s something important to recognize when defining it,” Myers said. “When it’s just focused on white women, it takes away from people trying to be more progressive. I know during COVID when George Floyd was murdered, a lot of businesses said ‘Oh, we need to make our spaces more diverse.’”

History teacher Jillian Merkle said she’s seen more awareness in the new wave of feminism and she is seeing the core of the movement progress beyond just white women.

“What I see from young people is so much more consciousness than my generation ever had, which is wonderful,” Merkle said. “I also see one of the issues with feminism (was that) it was predominantly white feminism.”

According to sophomore Tenzin Pedon, the modern feminist movement tries to include women of all backgrounds and moves away from the focus on white feminism. 

“As our society progresses, we’re trying to include every kind of woman,” Pedon said. “Before, it was only white women and then only women with land or money and husbands. Now we’re trying to get everyone’s opinion. It’s nice to see those (changes).” 

Merkle said the feminism and LGBTQIA+ movements have unified which has helped both become more diverse and wide-reaching.

“The more intersectional we can be with everything, the better. You don’t get to just fight for one thing, now fighting for all of our identities matters,” Merkle said. “(The) feminism and LGBTQIA (movements) have been able to merge.”

Brown said the term “feminist” may be too broad today as the LGBTQ movement has become a key part of feminism.

“(The term feminist) might be a little too broad now (unless) you’re trying to say anything specific, using just the word feminism is kind of useless,” Brown said “Recently, there’s been more LGBTQ acceptance (within the movement).”

According to Witte, gender identity plays a role in questions surrounding the new wave of feminism and how feminist advocacy organizations are tackling the issue legislatively. 

“There is a conversation around ‘what is sex?’,” Witte said. “What is gender? How do we define that? In Minnesota, the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) that was put forward for the state constitution included more language around sexual identity (and) gender expression to be more inclusive of LGBTQ.”

Since the start of the women’s rights movement, feminists have faced backlash for being aggressive, uncaring and unpleasant. According to Pedon, the current generation of young feminists is trying to move away from stereotypes and demand equal treatment in comparison to men.

“We’ve seen a lot of the angry feminist trope in the media where women who are passionate about their rights are created (to be) angry and crazy, which is a lot different from what they’re actually like,” Pedon said. “Every generation has their own (issues) regarding women’s rights. Our generation specifically has problems with having the same treatment (from) men then before.”

Senior Catie Miller said the feminist movement has changed in recent years. She said there is complicity at Park as well with people disregarding the movement.

“Feminism has gone to both extremes. It has gotten better in some ways and it has gotten worse in some ways and people are either very active in their feminism or are very complicit, there is even anti-feminism,” Catie Miller said. “Feminism is also very prevalent (at Park), especially with Girls United and other female-led clubs like Rock Climbing club. There are also a lot of people in the school who are complicit to all (of) those things and turn a blind eye.”

Senior Iris Flink said Gen-Z identifies more with feminist ideology but participates less in large-scale protests. She said, however, Park has held demonstrations in the past and is trying to uphold the history of the feminist movement. 

“(Gen-Z is) more feminist (than previous generations), but we’re more scared to show it (through) big, physical demonstrations that I’ve learned about in history class. Either my freshman or sophomore year, (Park) held a walkout,” Flink said. “There’s been two or three walkouts about harassment and stuff like that—(students) are trying to do stuff at Park.” 

According to Myers, most people at Park are supportive of the feminist movement, however, internal biases that lead to sexist ideology still exist.

“At Park, there’s more internal bias that people might have towards women, women of color, different genders, (people with) disabilities. It all plays into it,” Myers said. “(Sexism now) is more about internal bias than outright people being sexist. Although there still is that, for the most part, people at Park are pretty supportive of women.” 

Catie Miller said students at Park try to uphold the feminist movement and issues towards marginalized people, but their efforts aren’t always acknowledged by staff. 

“The students at least try to (embrace feminism) and that there is an attempt, especially by students who are a part of marginalized groups. Some people attempt to (embrace feminism) but when it comes to the staff, it tends to be pushed aside a lot,” Catie Miller said. 

According to Flink, Park tries to embrace the feminist movement, but the school tends to struggle with its promotion.

“(Park) tries to embrace (feminism). We have a large female staff at Park, but they don’t do a very good job of promoting as much. There’s little things for Women’s History Month,” Flink said. “There’s a slide show during Park Connections, but I’m unsure if that does much about feminism in Park.” 

According to Catie Miller, the feminist movement will continue to be important because it doesn’t just affect women. She said the feminist movement is still needed, as previous accomplishments of the movement have been regressed. 

“Feminism is always important because feminism affects men and women and everyone should be able to live their life safely and to be able to live as they are. Feminism will always be important, even if and when we have equal rights, (it’s) still important,” Catie Miller said. “We need to keep it because there are things such as Roe v Wade, which was created with the feminist ideology, that has been taken away from (women). When (feminists) have things in place, we need to make sure that they stay in place.”