Bertha Von Suttner, and her actions made a considerable impact on the 20th century. She laid the groundwork for many other activists like herself to try and combat the war, the actions involved, the use of weapons and peoples’ perspectives on it. Suttner grew up with the initiative to make herself aware of the contents of war after being raised in her childhood home with strong Military traditions forced upon her (Holt, 4). Unfortunately, these Military traditions fought against any pacifist behaviour along with her Austrian background (Holt, 3). In turn, these traditions only enraged her and encouraged her stronger as she grew up and further motivated her to become a strong female activist. Looking deeper into Suttner’s past, she came from …show more content…
One of the major core philosophies current in Suttner’s life is her theory of being a “powerless woman” (Holt, 5). As mentioned, women were very disregarded in this time so Suttner agreed that she was nothing but a woman who really served no purpose. Cohen makes reference to women today by mentioning how many women disagree with war but not very many will stand up and start a peace movement, finding it pointless because of the lack of power women were given in the past (Page 12). Suttner states “only those who have the power in their hand- this is something that pacifists realize- can put the idea into action. But this idea, if repeated clearly, frequently, and unanimously enough, also posses a power” (Page 5). Suttner’s strong words were advertising the gender inequalities that she was experiencing and making reference to how activists can promote power by continuously fighting for it and coming together. Suttner’s second main belief was that the “idea of dying for the homeland and fighting for the honour and glory” of fighting was wrong (Holt, 5). She provides strong support in this statement by tying in the theories many men held while at War. Along with that, she did not believe in promoting violence to children by their parents buying them toy soldiers (Holt, 5). Suttner believed that parents needed to raise their children in a sensible environment that provided a logical sense of fighting …show more content…
Her work as a pacifist was successful as well as how it played into a movement for women. This can be primarily argued because ten days after she passed away, the outbreak of World War I began (Holt, 8). This suggests that she played a very important part through her activism in keeping the means of war from getting worse while she was alive and fighting for peace. Branching off from her being a pacifist, as for her successful novel “Lay Down Your Arms” that can be argued as a success for a women’s movement. Seeing as, she was the first woman to ever win a Nobel Peace Prize, especially in a time where women were strongly disregarded, including herself for what she fought for, she really laid a groundwork for women to be more recognized as years advanced. It can be assumed that Suttners successes of her writing helped embark the journey of women being more recognized as well. Lastly, her work had such an impact on others that when she passed away, other woman adopted her work because they wanted to advance it further than Suttner did (Braker, 2). These three women, Anite Augspurg, Lida Gustava Heymann, and Helene Stocker all took a piece of Suttners work and advanced it in their own way to benefit society (Braker, 2). While Suttner took more of a focus on pacifism and only laid groundwork for a feminist perspective to arise, these three women took her aspects further while incorporating Suttners work