Women in Power

In more recent years the number of powerful women in television has increased. One of these powerful women is Leslie Knope from NBC's Parks and Recreation. The show follows Knope as she starts out as the deputy director of the parks and recreation department for the fictional town of Pawnee, Indiana. Throughout the show, she moves up through her local government and eventually begins a job in state government. The show first aired on NBC in 2009 and just ended this past February. The show was produced by Greg Daniels and Michael Schur according to NBC's website and this article on it. The two were also both producers for The Office at one point.

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Since the show first aired, Knope has become a sort of feminist icon. The character believes in equality, empowerment of women, and shows that women can hold a place in government, too. There are many instances throughout the show where she is promoting feminist ideology without ever really using the term itself. The writers of Parks and Recreation show Knope as a strong, independent, and smart women. She knows what she is capable of and will not let anyone stand in the way of her goals.

One of the many times where Knope shows what feminism means is when she creates the Pawnee Goddesses, a scout troop meant for girls because the boy's troop, the Pawnee Rangers, would not let the girls join. The Pawnee Rangers are lead by Ron Swanson, Leslie's boss, so she and Ron take both their troops on an outing. The boys of the Pawnee Rangers see how much fun the Goddesses are having and want to join. In this clip, Leslie sends a boy away and the young girls think that the boy should be allowed because Leslie taught them about equality. Leslie lets the Pawnee Rangers join the Pawnee Goddesses all in the name of equality. Isis Madrid talks about this specific event and many others in her article called "12 Times Leslie Knope Totally Nailed Being a Feminist."

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In another episode, Leslie meets with the first female city councilwoman. Leslie is inspired by her and starts a Gender Equality Commission to have more women in each department of her local government. The department with the largest inequality between workers is the sanitation department. In this clip, the heads of the sanitation department claim that not many women apply and that this type of manual work is too strenuous for women. To prove to the department that they should hire more women, Leslie and April, a former intern at the parks department, work on a garbage truck for a day to prove that women can do anything men can do.

In another episode title "Galentine's Day", Leslie gets all the women in her life together to celebrate being a women and all her friends the day before Valentine's Day. Here is a clip that describes what it is by Leslie. This shows another important aspect of feminism, which is supporting the women around you and celebrating their accomplishments.

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In an episode from the final season, Leslie's husband, Ben, is running for Congress. Leslie has been receiving criticism from a group of Men's Rights Activists and others for being independent and not being a traditional Congressmen's wife. In this clip, she makes a very important point. Leslie says, "If you want to bake a pie, that's great. If you want to have a career, that's great, too. Do both or neither, it doesn't matter. Just don't judge what someone else has decided to do." What Leslie is saying is that women aren't just supposed to be stay-at-home mom's, and they can be whatever they want to be. Another important point is that we shouldn't judge the women who want to be stay-at-home mom's instead of having a career. This important scene is talked about in this article by Marama Whyte.

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The way Leslie Knope is portrayed by the writers of Parks and Recreation as a feminist and positively. She eventually gets the respect that she deserves from the people she works with and always tries to make everything better for the people of Pawnee. She has helped teach many feminist ideas to audiences' over the years, which is discussed in this article from the Huffington Post by Maureen Ryan.