Feminism is holding women back

It’s easy to see why the online dictionary Merriam-Webster chose ‘feminism’ as their word of the year. 2017 kicked off with women across the globe marching against Donald Trump and ended with Time magazine heralding the #MeToo ‘silence breakers’ as their person of the year. Every glossy double-page spread further established feminism as this year’s fashion. Head cheerleader Jessica Valenti, writing in the Guardian (naturally) is cock-a-hoop about feminism’s resurgence:

‘Now we just have to continue to make it the movement of the year (and next year, and the next) until women can start to feel safe in their own country.’

Which would make perfect sense if Valenti was referring to women in Darfur or Yemen or Rohingya women fleeing Burma. But she’s not, of course. Valenti is referring to women in wealthy, western countries. Not the girls growing up on council estates targeted by grooming gangs or young mothers struggling to fit two part-time jobs into school hours.