"Feminism is exhibited by a spirit of unrest among a comparatively small number of dissatisfied women. They preach the gospel of unholy discontent. They are born agitators, and "dearly love a fight." They prefer war to peace; turmoil to tranquility; contention to concord; pride to humility; sophistry to truth; agnosticism to belief, and prefer to assert their own wills, "live their own lives" as against the precepts of all conventional morality, being moral anarchists." Benjamin V. Hubbard's view on feminism is certainly an extreme one. He angrily portrays feminists as "agitators" and suggests that their views have no foundation because of their angry unrealistic viewpoints on society. How extreme is this view? Is there any truth in it or is it biased, sexist and unfair? With a brief account of liberal feminism, socialist feminism and Marxist feminism it will become apparent whether feminism has a place in todays society and whether or not it is severely outdated and irrelevant to the times.
Liberal feminism is the longest standing type of feminism and it's political and social foundings create the basis to many other types of feminism. The first full statement of liberal feminism was stated by Mary Wollstonecraft in 1789. She argued that women are rational agents whose "inferiority" is primarily due to inferior education. The fundamental idea behind liberal feminism is to seek out equal rights with men and also to achieve individual freedom for women. "Liberal feminists include all those who campaign for equal rights for women within the framework of the liberal state, arguing that the theoretical basis on which this state is built is sound but the rights and privileges it confers must be extended to give them equal citizenship with men." Freedman's definition explains how liberal feminists main objective is to achieve equality between men and women in a liberal society. They believe that the roots of inequality lie in the lack of equal civil rights and educational opportunities.