Jasmine Brogdon ~ Staff Writer
Around a dozen women gathered in the foyer of Sydnor Performance Hall. They sipped on hot cocoa and ate delicate treats; they talked and exchanged pleasantries and geared to discuss the roles of women.
The discussion then moved inside the performance hall. A panel of four women set to dissect the mindset of women and outline a clear purpose of them in a typically male dominated field, politics.
On Oct. 27 from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m., Dr. Cheryl Jorgensen-Earp, professor of Communication studies at LC; Lisa Taylor, junior at LC; Barbara Rypkema, junior at LC; and Noel Wolfe, visiting assistant professor of American Culture, conversed eagerly and seriously on a matter that may be considered pressing.
Jorgensen-Earp discussed the trials of how earlier women went through many hardships to gain the right to vote. They were called Suffragettes. Often times the women were considered less than a real women or unattractive for wishing to share their opinions. She told how the women were force-fed and subjected to images that ridiculed them.
She displayed a series of posters made about the suffragettes. One in particular was of an upset child and a man in suit. The caption was “mommy’s not here, she’s a suffragette.”
Jorgensen-Earp conversed on how women were seen as being too emotional or far too important to children to know the ins and outs of voting. She joked that the people who made the poster must realize women didn’t vote every day.
She compelled women to take a stand and not waste the opportunity that others fought for them. She wants women to vote.
She also attempted to show the similarity of suffragette posters and how Hillary Clinton is portrayed in today’s memes. Many suffragettes were portrayed as troll-like women. The mouths of women in suffragette posters were being masked more often than not. She likened this to Clinton being coined a nasty woman and her being depicted with her mouth obstructed.
Jorgensen-Earp said this was a symbol of women being encouraged to go back to times before progress, that women were being forced to hide their voice. She proclaimed her support for Hillary Clinton. All of the other women’s speeches were equally as empowering and well- spoken.
Sophomore Caitlyn Tolley expressed her opinion on the matter “I do not think I should have to support Hillary just because she’s a woman. That is like saying I should support everything Hitler stood for because he was a human being…Trump is a lot of things. He speaks his mind, sometimes too quickly, and that tends to irritate some people. I like how he does not take money from foreign investors or other political people to fund his campaign. He isn’t running to be a pawn for the government; he’s running because he cares about making this country powerful again.”
You may wish to make your voice heard, be you man or woman. Voting on Nov. 8, could be a way to accomplish this.
