Vivie Warren:
I love that our society is standing up for equal pay and rights for women! It is completely and utterly unfair for women to be working just as hard, most of the time harder, then men and we get paid significantly less! I went to school and got a great education so that I could work to the best of my abilities and get the best job I could so that I can make more money. Even though it is “wrong” for me to speak up and support women, I am going anyway because I want to break those stereotypes of us being weak and only looked at for our beauty. Women are finally getting what they deserve! We deserve to be paid the same as men and to be able to get the same education as them. I don’t want to be restricted to doing things just because I am a woman. I don’t want to be judged for my looks or how many kids I can reproduce. I want to be looked at for my education, intelligence, and hard work! I am tired of all things revolving around men. Why do we have to live in a man’s world? I don’t care if I am being offensive or rude, I will speak my mind when I want to. It is a women’s world, and men are the ones that live in it! Also, I can’t stand when people ask me when I am going to get married, or who I’m attracted to. My mother and friends always pound me about Frank and if I want to marry him. Why do women always have to have a man that can support her? I can support myself just fine!
Editorial Commentary:
This article, titled, “Equal Pay for Equal Work, was published in 1917 in the newspaper, Life and Labor. As most people know, equal pay was a huge issue all over the world in the 1800s and 1900s. Women were getting paid significantly less than men were, even if it was the same job. The National American Women’s Suffrage Association was founded in 1890. Through Carrie Chapman Catt, as mentioned in this article, the association was able to pass the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, which granted women the right to vote. This was a massive step in giving women the right and equal opportunities as men. A reason that women were getting lower wages was simply because they got “women’s rates” of pay just because they were women. This is extremely unfair that just because they were women, they automatically got less pay for doing the same exact job as men. This angered many women, like new women and the character Vivie Warren, because it was completely unfair to them. Women got “60% of them men’s hourly rate” (Lloyd). This shows the women were treated poorly just because they were women. They were not being seen by their intelligence or education. In another scholarly source about equal pay, the author describes the fear that some women during this time were feeling if their pay were to increase and become the same as mens. Men were expected to make more money and provide for his wife and children to show their “masculinity” (Lloyd). This made some women not want to get equal pay because they didn’t want to strip their husband of his manliness. The idea of equal pay was also creating awareness for the idea of equal opportunities for women in the future.
"Equal Pay for Equal Work." Life and Labor, vol. 7, no. 9, Sept. 1917, p. 142. Women's Studies Archive, link.gale.com/apps/doc/BQQIRO951402392/WMNS?u=gale&sid=bookmark-WMNS&xid=48ca4f07. Accessed 11 Oct. 2023
Lloyd, Leonora. "Equal Pay and the Equal Pay Bill." Socialist Woman, Nottingham, vol. [2], no. [1], Feb-March 1970. Women's Studies Archive, link.gale.com/apps/doc/BJQYAX282677498/WMNS?u=gale&sid=bookmark-WMNS&xid=02a5665e. Accessed 11 Oct. 2023.