Barrantes, Hannah R.

Legal Philosophy
ARTICLE: Womens Civil Rights by Mariko Hirata
Thesis Statement: An equal political representation of men and
women does not necessarily lead to a fair society and country.
First Premise:
An equal political representation of men and women only speaks of
mere numbers.
Second Premise:
Mere numbers does not necessarily lead to a fair society and country.
Middle Term: Mere number
The Thesis is an opposition to the authors thesis which is: An equal
representation of men and women leads to a fair society and country.
The Thesis Problem
The Article suggests that the plight of womens right shows a
significant development over the years. From the right to
suffrage which pushed the women to take the fight on the
streets, to acquiring jobs outside of home, however, there is still
a pressing inequality in the form of discrimination, often times,
through the form of sexual harassment and other analogous
circumstances. The author claims that if there will be an equal
number of men and women in the political arena, then fair
society and country is most likely to follow. I dissent.
What constitutes a fair society and country?
I would like first to define and characterize the terms in the
thesis. An equal political representation means an equal number
of men and women in the different branches of the government,
while a fair society and country means a state where there will
be no discrimination when it comes to sexes, particularly credit in
work, societal respect, and leadership aspects.
The middle term: Mere number, is it enough to solve the plight of
discriminated women?
For me to arrive with my conclusion or thesis statement, the
middle term mere number shall be substantially analyzed. The
author suggests that number symbolizes power and influence in
the legislation. Particularly, rights are given in lieu of legislation,
and she assumes that if the numbers are equal, there is a great

tendency that women legislators will legislate for women and

men legislators will legislate for men. That sounds logical, but
when we take a look into the dynamics of politics and legislation,
we can derive that gender is not necessarily the determining
factor that one will work on the interest of a certain sector. The
author hastily generalized that all women will automatically work
for womens interest. We saw different women legislators over
the years who favored mens interests when they see that they
will suffer consequences, personally or politically, if they side
with the women.
While policies are driven by numbers, say for example members
of the congress voting for a particular bill to be passed, mere
number determined by gender does not necessarily reflect the
actions and to whose interest will a legislator side or act upon.
Even if we have an equal number of men and women in the
houses, if the women are not politically driven, then we will still
be locked to a patriarchal society that we are in.
Given this discussion, a positive conclusion may be derived from
the negative Thesis Statement. An equal political representation
of men and women does not necessarily lead to a fair society
and country, for it takes legislators who have political will to
forward the interests of their sexes to push for a fair society and
country.