The Oppression Of Women In Religion

Women in Religion Over the course of history religions have changed countless times in countless ways. However, many religions refuse to change one key aspect of their doctrine, that women cannot have the same roles as men. Some of the World’s most prominent religions do not allow women to have the equality that they deserve, some might even go as far as to say that these religions are participating in the oppression of women. The misogyny that many religions embrace as tradition or their deity’s will is detrimental to women around the globe. These outdated practices of systematically oppressing women have pushed some women away from their religions all together. In recent years, there has been a movement against these outdated traditions.

She is a professor at Lancaster University’s politics, philosophy, and religion department. Woodhead studies religions and seems to have a religious bias in her writing, she is very involved in her church, the Church of England. While not a columnist like Kristof, she has written many different books and journals. This article was published by the Washington Post, a very large news source. The Washington Post mostly focuses on politics without being solely liberal or conservative. The first sentence gives away the author’s argument immediately “we often ask whether religion is good for women but I think it’s just as interesting to ask ‘are women good for religion?’ I am not sure they are at the moment.” I find it very interesting that the person who is probably more qualified to talk about religious topics is choosing the less favored argument. Her argument is not one that would be expected of a woman in academia. It feels very surreal to read an article written by a woman arguing that our gender is bad for religion. She says in her article “some women are fighting for more control but some women are just leaving the churches or other religions - too much of a struggle, why waste their energies when they can be put elsewhere.” Her claim is that woman pushing for equality is not worth all of the effort that’s being put into it. She ultimately states that these women are the cause of “some of the religious decline we’re seeing in the west” and that “there is no obvious solution for the moment. It means that religion can, at the moment, be bad for women and women, paradoxically, can be bad for religion.” Her claims are so vastly different from Nicolas Kristof’s article. They are the opposite sides of the debate. Although, Woodhead does not appear to believe that woman are inferior to men, only that we should not push for equality on this front because the effort is