"Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed."

If nobody never started the women’s right movement or America never wrote the declaration of independence. Women would have never received equal rights, and we would still be under control of Brittan. Martin Luther King Jr. once said “Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.” He was saying that if African Americans didn’t demand their rights and fight for equality they will never get it, which is undoubtedly true. 
“The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a great example to prove this quote true. In the story women are completely controlled by men. She is labeled as mentally unstable and forced to be bed ridden until her “illness” has ran its course. In this time women had limited rights and everything they did had to overseen by their husbands. In one point of the play she says “I believe that congenial work, with excitement and change, would do me good. But what is one to do?” (Gilman 317). She knows that what is being done to her is wrong and she has a real solution to the problems she is faced with. If nobody in history ever stood up for what they believed in like the woman in “The Yellow Wallpaper” did, there would never be any change. Woman would probably still be faced with the same things that this woman was.
Today, the lack of freedom that is shown in “The Yellow Wallpaper” is much more of a rarity. Although it still exists especially in other third world countries. Some countries still don’t believe in equal rights. For example in some middle eastern countries men and women don’t even get to choose their spouse. It is chosen by their parents and other circumstances at birth who they will be forced to live with for the rest of their lives. If those citizens never speak up and express they want and need for freedom, they might never get the chance to choose their own husband/wife. But if suddenly a group of people started to demand something be change, it is much more likely for it to be done.