What Is Gail Winfrey A Victim

Oprah Gail Winfrey holds many titles-billionaire, philanthropist, publisher, producer, activist, media mogul and many more-but the title that catapulted her journey into the success she worked hard to achieve is: ‘victim’. She was the victim of rape, prejudice, and sexism. Her experiences as a victim gave her the strength and courage to prove that she can be more than her biological determinism; it also led her to become a strong proponent of women’s rights and thus, dedicate her show’s platform to validate women. Growing up during the Civil Rights era, Winfrey’s grandmother aspired for young Oprah to be employed as a maid to a nice, white family and probably would not have believed that she would become one of the most influential woman to
For the first six years of her life she was raised by her grandmother who worked as a maid and then moved to Milwaukee to live with her mother. Living with her mother, Winfrey faced troubling circumstances. She was raped and/ or molested by a cousin’s boyfriend and her father’s brother. When she discovered that she was pregnant at age 14, she ran away from her mother’s home and took to the streets. Winfrey was able to keep her pregnancy hidden until the baby was born premature and died shortly after. She moved to Nashville to live with her father who said she was given a “second chance” and therefore, positively influenced her to read books and to pursue her desire for knowledge. Despite her struggles, she enrolled in Tennessee State University where she began working in radio and
When she worked as one of the anchors of “People Are Talking” during the 1980s, she was only paid $22, 000 while her co-anchor, a white man, was getting paid $50,000. She bravely expressed her concerns to her boss who questioned why she-being a woman without having children to care for or not owning a house-should be paid the same amount as her co-anchor who did. Even though they were doing the same job, he did not believe she deserved to be paid more. In the online collection of original interviews MAKERS, Winfrey said that she did not “consider or call [myself] a feminist but I don’t think you can really be a woman in this world and not be.” After Oprah was hired to host the morning show, “AM Chicago” renamed a year later to “The Oprah Winfrey Show” in 1986, she went to her bosses and stated that her team needed to make more money which they answered with “Why? They are all girls.” (Makers 2013) This was a significant moment in Winfrey’s life because it resulted in her created Harpo Studios to take control of the show where she was the boss and she had the power to decide how much her team will earn. Her show became the highest-rated show in television