Gen X: The Only Generation of American Women to Live With Rights

I will turn 50 this September. I was born in 1975, and I represent the only generation of American women born with full rights that have been lost in the same lifetime.

My generation has witnessed anti-progress. A cultivated backpedal.

Celebrating the Olympic games at my grandparent’s house. Charleston, AR. Summer, 1984.

In the grand scheme of things, American women did not enjoy rights for very long.

All of my childhood pictures are in color — not black and white. The movie “Jaws” was released a few months before my birth. President Ford announced the end of the Vietnam War and Microsoft was founded in 1975. Women were officially allowed to join the Coast Guard and Wheel of Fortune and Saturday Night Live both debuted the year I was born.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show opened in 1975. The biggest song of the year was “Love Will Keep Us Together” by Captain & Tennille and the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sank in Lake Superior.

You are likely familiar with all of the trivia and events I just listed from 1975, because it wasn’t that long ago.

I was born 50 years ago with the rights that my daughters and granddaughters are losing or have already lost.

I was born six years after the right to a no-fault divorce was first established. This law allowed women to divorce based on "irreconcilable differences" without needing to prove fault on the part of either spouse.

I have always lived under legislation that allowed me to divorce.

I was born two years after Roe. The case established a woman’s right to an abortion and medical privacy under the law.

I have had reproductive rights for most of my adult life.

The Equal Credit Opportunity Act became law one year before I was born. This legislation made it illegal for banks to discriminate against loan and credit applicants based on sex. Before the ECOA, banks could legally refuse to grant women credit or they could require a husband's co-signature.

I have had the right to control my finances all my life.

I have had certain rights even if they were constantly under siege in my red state.

The rights that women have enjoyed for a full generation are being rolled back by Christian nationalists to support authoritarianism. A cultish form of Christianity to pave the way for the oligarchs to form an authoritarian government with Trump as the figurehead.

Everything from no-fault divorce to abortion to women having a bank account runs afoul of Christian nationalism and Evangelicalism. Their religion subjugates women and is antithetical to feminism and equal rights.

The patriarchy in general, and the Christian patriarchy in particular, subsists on the submission of women — either with a woman’s consent, or by force. Women must bend to the will of laws and regulations meant to keep them under the boot and without certain rights that would make them balk at forced compliance.

There is a nationwide push from some Republicans to roll back “no-fault” divorces. Republican Party platforms in Texas and Nebraska called for the removal of no-fault divorce in 2022, and Oklahoma lawmaker Dusty Deevers introduced legislation that would have removed married couples from filing for divorce on the grounds of incompatibility.

Deevers backed the bill after writing a piece declaring no-fault divorce was an “abolition of marital obligation.”

Abortion is now completely banned in Missouri even after voters just overturned our abortion ban last year and added the right to an abortion to our Constitution.

There is not one clinic in Missouri that can perform an abortion…even for a victim of rape. Even for a woman who could die from a pregnancy-related illness.

Republicans overruled the will of the people. They don’t care. Send it back to the states, right? Yeah, right.

Missouri schools have been defunded and 33% of our public schools run a 4-day week in order to pay for private religious schools from state funds. The Herzog Foundation, based just outside of Kansas City, has directly funded students in over 40 Christian schools through a voucher scheme.

Do you know what some of these private religious schools accepting taxpayer money teach? The “natural” submission of women. That women should keep quiet. Obey. Submit.

An Executive Order signed by Trump is raising concerns over the protection of women's financial independence, as well as other potential civil rights violations.

It calls for an “evaluation of all pending proceedings” under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act. If independent federal agencies abide by the order, women could be discriminated against for credit, and they could roll back guidance and regulations still in place to protect women's rights.

I don’t even have the time or mental space to talk about the proposed SAVE Act which could make it very difficult for millions of married women to vote.

Throughout my life, I’ve heard the argument that young men have been “falling behind” for decades and that women’s rights must be pulled back to let the men catch back up. That women’s rights have limited men’s rights.

That’s a lie.

Men can progress just like women have. Men can and should be able to get educated and find a job and get a bank account and get married and start a family (if and when they want) just like women have been able to do for an entire generation.

And if they can’t? Well, that’s their problem to figure out and it has nothing to do with women having equal rights.

Human rights aren’t pie. Giving rights to others doesn’t mean you get less. Equal rights are guaranteed under the Constitution…even if Republicans hate the Constitution.

I have lived my life with the rights my daughters have already lost. Many more rights are on the chopping block, but I am telling you, I will not go quietly and neither will the folks around me.

I have raised both young men and young women. In a true meritocracy, both flourish. Both do well in the world with equal rights. No one is left behind.

It will take more than mediocre male lawmakers — and a few water-carrying women legislators — to forcefully shove us back into an era we left behind.

I won’t be in the first and last generation of women with rights. You won’t force women out of the public sphere and back into the shadows.

We won’t go back. Bet.

~Jess