![]() ![]() She found them silly, wasteful of their potential, and reduced to children rather than women of importance. Wollstonecraft doesn’t hold her punches when addressing the middle class women of her time. Instead of educating themselves and being productive human beings, they chose instead to define themselves as male writers defined them: weak-minded seductresses, frivolous child-like creatures that appealed to flattery and felt whole only when admired by men’s gazes. ![]() Instead of blossoming into mature creatures, they allowed themselves to be treated by men as inferior in body and in mind. Wollstonecraft aptly draws an analogy between flowers and women, saying that the “rich soil, strength and usefulness (of the flower) are sacrificed to beauty.” In the same manner, women in her time were treated like sexual objects, beautiful things, and this treatment prevented them from developing their strengths, their true value. The section of her book that provokes pause and consideration occurs when she talks about the “neglected education of women.” Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman was published in 1792 and helped found the Feminist Movement of her time. ![]()
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