Female empowerment vs empowerment

How do you differentiate between something that is empowering while something that is specifically female empowering?

I've had this question on my mind a lot lately.

Do you think it is necessary to differentiate between the both? And is it wrong to claim something is female empowering if the sense of empowerment does not come from being a female?

I'm having some difficulty in explaining my thoughts here as I'm confused so some general thoughts about what you consider female empowerment would be appreciated too.

Quote from dummi

To empower women, power must be given to them. No one is really empowering women, they are simply encouraging them on whatever path they choose to follow. As for your main question, my personal opinion on the matter is that yes, women's "empowerment" is different, as it relates to the female experience. General empowerment can be given to anyone, and is not related to the female experience.

Interesting point.

I feel like encouraging can definitely give a sense of empowerment to people. So I do use them interchangeably.

Quote from superyeah

I think I get what you mean.

Take a look at these rhetorical examples I just came up with.

General empowerment:

A woman grows up in an impoverished area. She doesn't have the resources to help her chase her dreams. Her hardships are based on her socioeconomic situation, not anything to do with her gender. To motivate her so she can put herself in a better situation would be general empowerment.

A guy could be in the same situation and have the same hardships due to those situational circumstances; it would still also be empowerment if you were to motivate him and/or help him find the right resources.

Thus, this empowerment wouldn't be rooted in gender specifically.

Female empowerment:

A woman is in a male-dominated industry. She's just as capable as every guy there, sometimes even much more capable than some, but she's stereotyped to be lacking knowledge, experience, and intellect just because she's a woman. If you were to encourage her to keep going despite the prejudice and the hardships she faces as a woman in that field, that would be female empowerment.

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I would call the second one female empowerment too.

For the first situation, say when the woman gets in a position of power it definitely acts as a motivation for other women around her and sort of also breaks the glass ceiling. Do you think it would be an act of female empowerment then?

And if so was it just the act of putting someone who is female in power or because of the person on power that other female employees get motivated

Quote from livingbarbiedoll

For some reason I find the whole "female empowerment" thing so cringy and annoying. If they feel the need to be empowered 24/7 they perhaps believe that they are weak. I go on instagram and all I see is pages that are trying to make women feel better. Ask yourself why men don't do that.

Maybe because patriarchy exists and it's women who've been the victim of abuse for decades rather than men

Quote from Lunevie

I guess some women just like feeling empowered and not actually being empowered... like men.

Maybe it's because historically men have been given the power while it is being taken away from women