Glamour has officially chosen a woman of the year, the beautiful and bold, Caitlyn Jenner. Despite her bravery and her overwhelming decisions to transition into who she truly always was, many people are disappointed in Glamour magazines choice to name Jenner “Woman of the Year”. Scroll through the comment section of the Instagram post announcing Jenner as the winner and you’ll see that women around the world aren’t in support of Glamours decision.
There’s no doubt Jenner has made huge contributions to the transgender movement but what social media has begun to ask is, what exactly has she done for the advancement of woman? I can’t begin to imagine the struggle she’s been through for the past 66 years, years of feeling one way and having to express yourself in another way. Years of being put into a label that she didn’t relate to.Years of being told she was something that she never was.
Jenners contributions to the transgender community are astounding but they don’t have much of an effect on the community of Glamour readers, many of whom have never struggled with gender identity. The main arguement that she doesn’t deserve this title is not because she’s transgender, but because average Glamour readers don’t feel that she has contributed to women’s issues this year.
Other canidates such as Reese Witherspoon, cofounded a production company this year and started producing movies like Wild and Gone Girl which feature female protagonists. This is a great example of a woman giving her time purely to the advancement of women. The reason so many people are sounding off on social media is because for woman, this seems to be more advancing.
Jenner is more than welcome to win an award for Woman of the Year if she is actually doing something with her womanhood for women. But many are struggling to find what she has done for women’s issues this year. Some comments blasted Jenner for showcasing a younger generation that being a woman is curly hair, make up, and boobs because this was what she was portraying on the cover of Vanity Fair, she could have used this as an example to girls that being a woman is more than what you look like physically, but she didn’t.
Some readers have chosen new women to be the woman of the year, women who they feel have embodied womanhood, women who died for their country or who paved the way for other women to become Army Rangers. What about Jennifer Lawrence who published an essay this year about the pay gaps between men and women in Hollywood? How about actress turned humanitarian, Angelina Jolie, who underwent a double mastectomy because she knows breast cancer is common for women in her family? These women deserve to be women of the year over Jenner because her actions were victorious for the transgender community alone. She is brave, she is strong, she is courageous and has moved mountains in her own community, but readers aren’t supportive of her winning this title.
With her new title she has endless chances to show the world what women really are made of.
Check out the Women of the Year article and comments here:
http://www.glamour.com/inspired/blogs/the-conversation/2015/10/woty-2015…