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Denmark gets new feminist party

The Local Denmark
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Denmark gets new feminist party
Photo: Iris/Scanpix

New political party Feminist Initiative says it wants to put feminist issues on Denmark’s political agenda.

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The party, which was founded on June 5th this year, has now made its political agenda public, reports newspaper Politiken.

Sister parties of the same name already exist in fellow Nordic countries Norway, Finland and Sweden – gaining 20,000 votes in the last general election in the latter.

Denmark’s version of the party currently consists of 12 female committee members, writes Politiken, and will enter five candidates during upcoming municipal elections in Copenhagen.

One of the party’s candidates, 36-year-old Muneeza Rosendahl, told Politiken that she did not think the choice of the word ‘feminist’ in the party’s name would put off voters.

“Feminism is not just about equality, but about everyone taking part in society equally. It’s a criticism of power and a fight for civil rights. Perhaps the word ‘feminism’ will scare people a little to start with, but we hope to win the word back,” she said.

“We want people to understand that we are not just a bunch of angry women that want to get one over on men, but that we support equality for both men and women, and that we also want to improve men’s rights,” Rosendahl continued.

Feminist Initiative (Feministisk Initiativ)’s political platform includes campaigning against employment discrimination as well as support for equal maternity and paternity leave.

The party also wants to enforce gender quotas in city councils, writes Politiken.

“We want to challenge this because we don’t believe there is a biological reason for women to be more interested in social care committees and men to be more interested in technical committees. It comes from childhood, when girls at daycare play princesses and boys play robbers and soldiers. So there are norms and structures that oppress and discriminate, and this is what we are taking issue with. We want to create a space where we don’t see people as groups, but as individuals, and give them individual choices,” Rosendahl told the newspaper.

The forthcoming candidate said she believed enforcing quotas was necessary to enable better individual choice in the long term.

“Yes, when you apply quotas you restrict individual choice, but you can also ask whether it is a free choice at all, or whether it’s structurally determined that women and men make the choices they do?”, she said.

“We don’t think it’s right that city council committees can resemble homes from the 1950s,” Rosendahl added.

The in addition to its five municipality candidates, the party will also enter a further two candidates for regional council elections in Greater Copenhagen, according to Politiken’s report.

READ ALSO: Is this Danish shoe ad a satirical feminist rallying cry or just plain sexist?

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