Most Americans Are Feminists (But Don't Know It)

The YouGov Poll recently did an interesting survey (questioning a random national sample of 1,000 American adults between July 26th and 28th, with a margin of error of 5 points). They asked a simple question -- Are you a feminist? And they received a resounding "NO". About 75% of Americans said they were not a feminist, while only 25% said they were (see the chart above).

Those are some shocking numbers, especially considering feminism is just the belief that women should have the same rights as men. Obviously, the public has accepted the GOP propaganda that feminists are wild-eyed radical who burn bras and hate men. But then the folks at YouGov did an interesting thing -- and got a very interesting result when they did it.

The read to poll's respondents a dictionary definition of a feminist -- that it designates "someone who believes in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes". Then they asked the question again. The result is in the chart below. After hearing the definition, about 60% said they were feminists and only 35% said they were not. That 35% is about right -- because that's about the percentage of the population (composed of fundamentalists and teabaggers) that think women should be second-class citizens and submit to the authority of men (particularly White men).

It's sad that so many people misunderstand just what feminism really is. It has always been the simple belief in the equality of women and men. Yes, there were some rambunctious demonstrations as the feminist movement got started, and some bras were burned and fiery rhetoric spoken. But that was needed at the time to bring the issue of gender equality to the forefront. Those demonstrations were just a tool (like the anti-war demonstrations or the civil rights demonstrations) to get people to think about the issue -- and were never the definition or meaning of feminism.