Welcome to Breaking Down Patriarchy. I'm Amy McPhee, Allabest. Today we're going to talk about a document from the 18th century called the Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen by Olaanpe de Gouge. This declaration is considered an essential text in the study of human rights, but I had never heard of it until I did this podcast project and looked up a reading list of essential text in human rights and women's rights. And I had never heard the name Olamte de Guj or this declaration before doing that. And my guess is that most listeners have never heard of this

declaration either, even though it is so important in history. An 18th century declaration that I,

of course, had heard of and that most listeners will certainly have heard of is the United States

Declaration of Independence, which was written, of course, in 1776. In France, their landmark announcement of human rights was called the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen,

and it was written in 1789.

Both of these declarations made really important steps forward toward a more inclusive democracy. But both declarations contained

glaring omissions. In both countries, white male landowners continued to enslave and exploit

their fellow human beings. And astonishingly, these declarations of human rights made no mention of that obscene

violation of the values that they were espousing in their documents, the values of life,

liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, or liberty, equality, fraternity.

And further, flying in the face of their noble assertions of human rights, both

documents completely excluded women. So in France, after the Declaration of the Rights of Man

and the Citizen came out, there was a woman who immediately recognized those omissions, and she wrote a rebuke

and a correction to her country's declaration. Her response to the Declaration of the Rights of

Man and the Citizen was the Declaration of the Rights of Women and the Female Citizen. And that's the

text that we're going to discuss

today. But first, let me introduce my reading partner for today's episode, Lindsay Olivevest. Hi,

Lindsay. Hello. This will be a great discussion. But before we do that, before we dive into

the document itself, I'll introduce us a little bit to Olamte de Guz.

So Olamte de Guz was born Marie Guz in southwest France in 1748. Her family was middle class.

We know that she had some education in her youth because she was a really great writer. But she was married against her

will at age 16 to one of her father's business associates. The following year, so when she was

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