It's Not Feminism, It's Humanism

Feminism Around The World

New Zealand
Maori culture was traditionally matrilineal, although colonial society later dominated the country and established its own cultural norms in place of that of the Maori. However, it may be this factor, in combination with the Kiwi's drive to attract women to move to the country by offering good rates of pay, that led to New Zealand being the first country in the world to award women the vote in 1893. In 2005, New Zealand made history again when it become the first country in the world to have all its highest offices help by women.

India
A perfect example of how Western feminism isn't a copy-and-paste movement that works for all cultures. Western feminism originated from the rise of individualism, while India's culture can value self-denial for the greater good. India is a large country, populated by many religions and different cultures, so a variety of feminist ideologies are needed to accommodate different issues and cultural practices. Early Indian feminism in the nineteenth century saw the Hindu and Sikh practice of 'Sati' (widow immolation) abolished, age of consent regulated, and child marriage banned, among other progress. Modern Indian feminism addresses issues such as modernisation vs tradition, education opportunities, dress code, and autonomy. International attention has been given to cases of sexual assault in India, with some citing it as a particular national issue.

Iceland
On 24 October 1975, women in Iceland walked out of their homes and jobs to rally in Reykjavik's Down Square. Called the 'Woman's Day Off', (or for some of the men left behind 'The Long Friday'), without women working or looking after the children, the country ground to a halt. Credited with the changing way of thinking, five years late Iceland had a female president. Since then, it has introduced paid paternity leave (in 2000) and has topped WEF's Global Gender Gap Index since 2009, with 44 percent of parliament made up by women.

Saudi Arabia
Although there has been a women's rights movement in Saudi Arabia since the sixties, the female population has very few rights compared to Saudi men. The country has received international scrutiny for its illegalisation of female drivers, the fact that all women are required to have a male guardian to make certain legal decisions for them and that women were not able to vote until well into the twenty-first century. After a long battle for suffrage, women were granted the right to vote and run for parliament in 2011. In 2015 that ruling came into effect and women are starting to exercise these rights for the first time.

The Philippines
Having granted women the vote in 1937, the Philippines is now ranked as one of the top countries in the world for gender equality. Prior to colonisation, Filipino society gave equal weight to maternal as well as paternal lineage, in addition to giving women the power to divorce their husbands and own their own property. Although women's rights were set back by colonisation and the dissemination of patriarchal Christian values, the Philippines' history of gender parity stood feminist campaigners in good stead of effect social change. The Philippines now ranks fifth among 136 countries on the Gender Gap Index, with Filipino feminists campaigning for, among other causes, greater parity of representation in government.

The United States of America
Gender equality in the US is largely comparable to that of the UK. Both countries influenced each other's feminist thinking throughout their years and women gained rights at roughly the same time. However, there are some areas that are the subject of fierce discussion. The US is there only country considered to be 'developed' that doesn't guarantee paid maternity leave, with women able to exercise the right to 12 weeks' unpaid leave. Surprisingly for the nation that could be described as the birthplace of second-wave feminism, there has been also recent controversy surrounding birth control and abortion, with more than 282 abortion restrictions enacted since 2010, including increases of the required waiting period and number of times a woman must visit a doctor before an abortion.