Marie Popelin
This is me in front of Brussels’ Palais de Justice where the infamous Popelin affair took place. This was where Marie Popelin tried to sue/challenge the Belgium legal system. To give some background, Marie Popelin was a woman born in the mid 1800s right outside of Brussels. She and her sister were educated uncommonly well and became teachers. She had a progressive mentor and she went on to run an all girls school but then later left. She felt that she needed a change and went to school to become a lawyer. Her application to the bar was refused on the basis of gender despite there being no laws against women being lawyers. She tried to sue Belgium, lost, appealed, and then lost again. This was known as the Popelin affair. From there she recognized that the legal system had problems that needed to be solved first. She became an influential suffragist.
Her contributions were important because she showed the flaws in the Belgium justice system, she created the Belgian League for the Rights of Women, and, was a trailblazer. She fought hard for the rights of women and was an advocate. She also helped the league to gain international connections. She laid the foundation to legal system justice in regards to gender. I like this quote from her saying that a woman “can also have special skills that she must have the right to apply.” I personally love my schooling and I'm grateful to women like her so that I can have the right to practice as a speech pathologist. It would be such a frustration to not be able to apply my skills professionally just because I am a woman.
In my opinion, She has not been commemorated well. When I typed it into google it even asked me if I meant “Marry Poppins” instead of Marie Popelin. What a shame! She was once on a stamp, and has a sad little street named after her, which I have heard is lined with trash. This makes me sad because she was a fighter and exposed so many problems and tried to do something about it. She has been my favorite woman that we have learned about so far so I wish that she was more recognized. She deserves to be commemorated better.
Works Cited:
The Brussels Times. (n.d.). https://www.brusselstimes.com/145745/who-was-marie-popelin-the-brussels-woman-honoured-by-googles-today-ulb-first-female-lawyer-belgium-feminist-pioneer-ligue-belge-du-droit-des-femmes-conseil-national-des-femmes-belge-emilie-timmermans
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ReplyDeletePopelin encountered resistance and discrimination as she sought to enter the legal profession, facing skepticism and barriers to enrollment in law school. While significant progress has been made since Popelin's era, obstacles to gender equality persist today. Women still face disparities in pay, representation in leadership roles, and access to education and healthcare. Discrimination and gender stereotypes continue to hinder women's advancement in various fields.
ReplyDeleteI love this Anna! Popelin also faced a lot of (what I think to be) undue criticism for her intense personality, largely on the basis of her gender. She was hampered and prevented from taking the bar because of her gender, which seems crazy now. It's wonderful that we've progressed past that institutionalized sexism, but it still persists in different ways.
ReplyDeleteVery well said about everything in this post. She contributes to Brussels being seen as a cultural capital because of the role justice plays in the government and among the people. For women, they received pushback when they tried to go outside the “norm”. Marie had a front-row seat to this when she got denied to the bar because she was a woman. It shows that people are willing to put the law or the government on trial to get what they feel is right. Marie had every right, but it just didn’t work. So, she continued on and did something else that helped establish different societies for women. Societies that have contributed to the cultural status of this city.
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