The great heroine of the US feminist movement never betrayed her conscience. She obtained great posthumous victories.
by Marco Respinti*
*Introduction to the webinar “Tai Ji Men Women: Fighting for Justice and Conscience,” co-organized by CESNUR and Human Rights Without Frontiers on November 25, 2024, United Nations International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women
The United Nations celebrates the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women since 1999. It should worry everybody that in the year 2024 it is still needed to observe such a day. It means that humankind has still not learned from its mistakes. Gender-based harassment and violence are still daily plagues in too many places of the world. Much still needs to be accomplished before presenting ourselves as a truly civilized people.
It is then proper today to underline the great role played by women in the sad Tai Ji Men case as well. A peaceful, law-abiding, patriotic group of citizens of the Republic of China in Taiwan has been and is persecuted by the state on a fabricated accusation of tax evasion. The harassment has lasted for more than a quarter of a century, with the result that fundamental rights such as religious liberty have been curtailed. Women suffered and suffer the most for upholding the right of the Tai Ji Men community in front of blatant injustice, defending the irreducible prerogatives of every human being’s conscience.
To illustrate this, I would like to use the example of an extraordinary American woman who lived in the late 19th century. She of course had nothing to do with Tai Ji Men, but meditating on her life and deeds may serve our purpose.
Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906) was born in Adams, Massachusetts, in 1820. She championed the abolition of slavery and was an ardent feminist. She took part in the famous meeting that another great woman and feminist, Lucretia Coffin Mott (1793–1880), organized in Seneca Falls, New York state, on July 19–20, 1848. It was an historic event that started a whole movement directed to fight against inequalities. It centered on women’s rights and culminated in the “Declaration of Rights and Sentiments.” The text was crafted by a third famous feminist, Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902), and strongly supported by the iconic male black abolitionist Frederick Douglass (1818–1895).
It is noteworthy that the “Declaration of Rights and Sentiments” was based on the 1776 US “Declaration of Independence” as if the famous sentence contained in its Preamble, “all men are created equal”, was yet to be recognized and implemented in its full meaning. Of course, at that time it was clear to all that the word “men” meant “human beings” and included both biological men and biological women. Feminists like Anthony and Mott clearly intended that “all men are created equal” meant “all human beings are created equal.” They objected not to the use of the word “men” in the “Declaration on Independence,” but to the discrimination of women within the totality of “men,” i.e., of humankind.
Anthony signed the “Declaration of Rights and Sentiments” two weeks later, during a second meeting in Rochester, New York state. In the following decades, Anthony, Mott, and Stanton get to know each other better, giving birth to the American Equal Rights Association in 1866. Later, in May 1869, Anthony and Stanton founded the Nation Women’s Suffrage Association advocating for women’s right to vote. In November of that same year, a rival organization was created, the American Woman Suffrage Association, when a portion of the equal rights movement, taking up the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution, passed in 1868, was satisfied with granting voting rights to African American males and forgetting women of all colors.
Feeling betrayed, Anthony and Stanton refused to acknowledge the 14th Amendment if that didn’t include also women. At the end of the day, they separated from fellow abolitionist Douglass and continued alone their fight for women. Soon, while Stanton never forgot that split, Anthony, always believing that unity was strength, put herself into hard work to reunite the movement. She succeeded in 1890, when the two previous inimical groups were molded into a new third one, the National American Woman Suffrage Association. Anthony was totally right. After twenty years, women in America obtained the right to vote through the 19th Amendment to the Constitution in 1910.
Yet, none of those great women lived enough to see that day. Anthony, who died in Rochester in 1906, fought her whole life to build a better future for those to come without enjoying that radiant victory. She was only able to obtain that women could enroll at the University of Rochester in 1900—quite an achievement for those times.
Anthony came from a Quaker family. Her relatives took the more leftist side when Quakers split into a liberal and a conservative faction in 1826. In years, she became quite hostile to every form of organized religion and was regarded as an icon of liberalism. Nonetheless, Anthony toured the world for 45 years giving 75 to 100 public speeches per year, always strongly defending the rights of women also to be wives and mothers.
Anthony and her friend Stanton (who held quite liberal views on marriage) were staunchly opposed to abortion. They equaled that to slavery and defending human life since the beginning was part of their abolitionist effort. They gave birth to a pro-life feminist movement that in the US exists to this day. It propagated the idea that men cannot impose anything on women, including the life or death of the creatures that women, and only women, can welcome and nurture in their womb.
Anthony and her friends and colleagues were indeed quite radical. They were radical in defending the rights of women, accepting no excuse. They were radical in their fight against female oppression from men, society, and the state. They were radical in defending justice, peace, equality, and life—all the ingredients for a decent world.
They are true symbols of feminism and may serve as a fitting example for the women of Tai Ji Men, who fight the same good fight: for justice, peace, equality, and life.
