By: Liberty Kyle
The Gender Equality Registered Student Organization is new to Bellarmine and already making a name for itself.
This organization was started by a group of students in the Brown Leadership Learning Community. Their goal for this RSO is to spread awareness about feminism and the true meaning behind this often misunderstood term.
President Eva Parke, a freshman, has a passion for this topic, which helped push her to form this organization.
“So feminism and it’s truest meaning of the political and social economic equality of the sexes is super important to me as well as overall gender equality for non-binary gender identities. There used to be a club about this here but they were a lot of upperclassmen so it didn’t last very long,” Parke said.
Parke also said she received help from fellow classmates, including Annika Yeske, another freshman in the Brown Leadership Learning Community.
Yeske said: “Well, I think that feminism in general has such a negative connotation to it and a lot of people today still refuse to call themselves a feminist because they think that being a feminist means favoring women over men but it’s really just about equality.”
In one of the group’s recent meetings, it focused on gender equality and how to be aware of others when referring to someone whose pronouns are unknown. Pronouns relate to how people want to be identified based on the genders with which they identify.
Haylee Wright, another member of Gender Equality, said: “For me it’s like treating everyone the same. I like to think of it as Gender Equity.”
The RSO wants to make others aware that feminism does not just focus on equality for women but also on equality for everyone. The members will do this by having meetings where they educate people on issues of feminism that are misunderstood and explain certain terms used for identifying.
Members also warn people of derogatory terms used toward people of certain identities that they may not know are derogatory. This club is meant to educate people on gender barriers as well as how to eliminate these barriers.
Meetings are not held on a specific day or at a specific time, but the group posts its events and meetings on Engage when they have been planned. Students can go to the Gender Equality Club page on Engage if they are interested in becoming involved.