In February, Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique will have been published 45 years ago. I'm pretty sure that if you ask most women on the street what The Feminine Mystique is about, she'll probably guess it's about picking out sexy underwear for your boyfriend. It isn't. Here's the introduction:
Over and over women heard in voices of tradition and of Freudian sophistication that they could desire--no greater destiny than to glory in their own femininity. Experts told them how to catch a man and keep him, how to breastfeed children and handle their toilet training, how to cope with sibling rivalry and adolescent rebellion; how to buy a dishwasher, bake bread, cook gourmet snails, and build a swimming pool with their own hands; how to dress, look, and act more feminine and make marriage more exciting; how to keep their husbands from dying young and their sons from growing into delinquents. They were taught to pity the neurotic, unfeminine, unhappy women who wanted to be poets or physicists or presidents. They learned that truly feminine women do not want careers, higher education, political rights--the independence and the opportunities that the old-fashioned feminists fought for. Some women, in their forties and fifties, still remembered painfully giving up those dreams, but most of the younger women no longer even thought about them. A thousand expert voices applauded their femininity, their adjustment, their new maturity. All they had to do was devote their lives from earliest girlhood to finding a husband and bearing children. (You can read the entire excerpt- if you're interested- here. )
Yes, feminism started as a way to approach the "problem with no name," the fact that women were not only unhappy, they felt invisible in their homes. They felt becoming a doctor was less "feminine" than choosing to be a nurse, and math was something boys needed to do. They went off to college for an M.R.S, and hoped for a nice husband to support the 2.5 offspring when they went to live in a big house where the grass was so much better really for the children. It was monumental and revolutionary when Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem pointed out that maybe women could have other choices. If you know, they wanted them.
It started from such a benign place I'm puzzled exactly when it became a dirty word. Back when I was teaching in Arkansas, I never had a female student make a single comment about their lives without looking around nervously and mumbling, "I'm not a feminist or anything but..."
I mean, there they were, in their little skirts, drinking their Big Gulps of Diet Coke, beaming with artfully rendered makeup and tiny diamond earrings and long blonde locks wrapped around their freshly tanned fingers, earnestly declaring that Lawd, the last thing they would ever ever ever ever ever want to be as a card-carrying University of Arkansas co-ed is a feminist. What if that got out around the campus? I know, that would just be like you know so uncool! OMG! But let me ask you now: Why? What horrible thing did Betty Friedan do by suggesting that maybe maybe some women wanted to do something else? Be a physicist? Become Sally Ride? Run for office? That maybe biology wasn't destiny?
To my memory, there were no police raids at that time forcing women into taking jobs outside the home. No one dragged anyone kicking and screaming from the washer-dryer. No one said, for heaven's sakes, give those pesky children of yours up for adoption and be a realtor! Hey, there's no doubt there's been a huge backlash from 60's style feminism, but it wasn't from what the feminists were asking for. They were just asking for more choices. It was from a kind of media hysteria which happily proclaimed that well, if you're more powerful than men, no man will want you! You'll be alone! But that wasn't true. Most of my friends married very nice men who liked that they were strong and interesting and diverse. So why, as Susan Faludi once wrote, is "fear and loathing of feminism is a sort of perpetual viral condition in our culture?" Check out this newly minted thought from Generation Cedar:
One of the feminist lies is that a woman can only be truly free in a career outside her home.
Wait - what? Who said a woman can only be free that way? Betty Friedan didn't. Gloria Steinem didn't. I know I didn't. Why is this crusading judgement suddenly ascribed to feminists, who I'm sure appear in their nightmares with dirty hair and unshaved armpits? At what point did anyone tell anyone this?
As far as I can tell, some of my friends with young children stopped working for awhile to be home with them. They didn't hire a baby nurse and go back to the office on the Tuesday after labor. They like being moms. And the ones that did get back to the office after awhile because they take pride in what they do in the world seem to be raising very nice little beasties. I mean, having a mom that has priorities in addition to mothering isn't a death sentence - say what you will, but clearly Hilary Clinton was a terrific mother. She and Chelsea are very close, and unlike *cough* certain presidential *cough Bush* children, she has yet to have one embarassing drinking binge in public.
Nothing is perfect, and we haven't worked out all the kinks - but do we really want to throw the baby out with the bathwater after all that? Look, I shave my legs. I even wear mascara when I remember to which isn't terribly often, but still. I like to buy clothes. I've read the entire Jane Austen. Three times. I'm kind of a girly-girl, in fact. Ask anyone. The fact that I want to hold on to the idea that I can choose a thousand different ways to live from finishing a book to finding a great job to trying to make Hapa Boy a happy camper and that I equally admire the job that Michelle Obama and Hilary Clinton have done with their families as much as I admire their fire and intelligence and place in the working world doesn't make me someone who argues with anyone else's choice to stay home and raise children or learn to bake or make fancy dinners.
It just makes me a feminist. That's all.
17 comments:
And ultimately, feminism was/is about EVERYONE having more choices - men too. As with many, many things in our culture, feminism is not what popular media proclaim it to be.
Just a couple of quotes for you from your ladies:
"[Housewives] are mindless and thing-hungry...not people. [Housework] is peculiarly suited to the capacities of feeble-minded girls. [It] arrests their development at an infantile level, short of personal identity with an inevitably weak core of self.... [Housewives] are in as much danger as the millions who walked to their own death in the concentration camps. [The] conditions which destroyed the human identity of so many prisoners were not the torture and brutality, but conditions similar to those which destroy the identity of the American housewife." ~ Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique, 1963.
"[Housewives] are dependent creatures who are still children...parasites." ~ Gloria Steinem, "What It Would Be Like If Women Win," Time, August 31, 1970.
Just putting those out there! Seems pretty anti-homemaker to me. Have a lovely day.
Ah, this is so very well said!
Hi, just came over from Molly's and have been looking around. Just wanted to say that I'm an evan. Christian and agree with this post. --Deborah
just curious why u didn't post my comment? did it not go through? I can't imagine you wouldn't post something just because it was contrary to what you wrote, that doesn't seem your character.
I'm sorry Amy - I didn't mean to ignore you, I just didn't have a chance to respond. :)
I've seen those quotes around (Vision Forum Ministries, anyone?) and I have two responses to them, so I'm glad to have the opportunity.
The first is that both are quoted out of context - particularly Steinem's quote. She was actually referencing another reference - but I can't find the original, I'm still looking, and I don't want to misquote her again - so more to come. As to Betty Friedan, she herself admitted that she was using a lot of hyperbole at the time of her book, and she recanted the entire statement before she died. She herself was a housewife, by the way. But that's a little besides the point. I should have said -"No one has felt that way for 40 years" to be more exact, so you're right there.
But two things. First, Steinem and Friedan were never against "housewives" as a group. In fact, Steinem argued that the media often made it seem as if it was pitting housewives against feminists - a view that many evangelical Christians still hold on to (wrongly in my opinion). Her view was that housewives worked harder than anyone - and got shafted and should be paid for their toil, and that she hated the idea that the woman's movement was media-driven to "exclude housewives." You have to remember that 45 years ago - there was no choice. Both Friedan and Steinem were very concerned with offering choice, since one area of symptomatic depression seemed to be a feeling of being stuck that many (if certainly not all!) housewives of that era felt. The idea was not that all women should throw down their aprons because it was worthless is simply not one that feminists were sprouting - the idea was that their very WORTHY work was being given no worth by society. It was not housewives they looked down upon, it was the lack of opportunity and unceasing work that women faced - simply because of how society related to gender. Whether you agree or not, they were not pointing fingers at YOU - as the quotes seem to suggest. It saddens me that it reads that way, as it isn't so.
The truth is that both of my (heh) ladies felt that it was not enough to simply take a cashier job and achieve worth because it was outside the home - that isn't the point. The thought was that women should not feel that the desire to be, say, a chemist was not "feminine." I take umbrage with the school of thought that suggests that God says women should only be in the home or helpmeets - whether they are suited to this or not. If you CHOOSE it, then I have absolutely no right to question your choice. However it is very different to have it decried the only "right" experience.
BTW, a recent interview with Steinem had her saying this on Sunday Morning:
"And just as in the past, those expecting a fire-breathing radical, like teenagers at the Hotchkiss School in Connecticut, are in for a surprise.
“Do you not think it's possible for someone to actually be comfortable being a housewife? Because, frankly, I think that's a choice that any woman should have,” one male student asked her.
“I think men should have it, too. And as long as I see no men making the choice, I worry about things that are unequal. I just think it's an index of suspicion,” she replied.
So you see - choice.
There has been an evolution of thought in this area, and I think every contemporary feminist is concerned with the work/home ratio. I think feminists would like a balance in their lives. For most of them however (and this is my contention, so don't quote me lol), this does not correspond with a return to patriarchy which is rather scarily dependent on having the right mate, but an equation that will provide fathering time as well as mothering time.
So I think the Quiverfull blogs like to whip up women who are home and housewiving as if to say, "see they look down on you!" But I think that's a misreading. I think the point was always to provide women with choices. Whether you take them or not is entirely up to you - which is what I meant by not throwing out the baby with the bathwater, ie, deciding to be home (even if through a religious conviction) is a very different thing for most women than being "stuck" there. :)
I'm so honored you're reading me - thanks!
I wanted to add that acting as if every feminist subscribed to exactly the same viewpoint is a little like saying that EVERY Evangelical Christian believes that women should never have had the vote! There are shades of gray in everything, and it does make me sigh to be painted a certain color - I don't like stereotypes for ANY group. I wish the term "feminist" was pronounced like "nazi" in some circles, that's all! :)
Whoops - That should be "wasn't."
My bad.
Thanks! I just wanted to know how you would respond to those quotes!
I think that Chelsey Clinton is a very lovely young women, but the Bush ladies are equally lovely. The put down was unneccesary. You don't have to knock the daughters because you disagree with the politics of the father. I did not vote for Obama, but I think his wife and daughters are lovely. I disagree with his politics but I respect the office he is about to hold.
I wonder what your college years would look like under a microscope?
Oh I think it was necessary. :) Because it's true, and they are held up as "lovely young women." While they were (are) actually drinkers and carousers. Sure many young girls do the same - but they were not exactly modeling the behavior that they represented.
MY college years? Well, I'll tell you. Nothing to Youtube - I've never been able to drink, and pot put me to sleep. I know, I should have had more fun like the Bush girls. :)
But - THANKS for reading and commenting, Anon. Really, it's wonderful to read comments!
MOD, I totally respect your right to say what you want on your blog, and you're right that there are varying degrees of conservatism among even the most conservative Christian women. I mean, not only to I value my right to vote, but when I posted that if my conscience demanded I could evn vote differently than my hubby, it was not meant with pleasant responses.
But as to the Bush girls vs Chelsea Clinton, I think it's one area that neither of us know enough about to judge or compare. Because Chelsea was never caught publicly drinking and carousing doesn't mean she didn't do it. Just means she was more discreet than Babs and Jen.
And to say that "they were (are) actually drinkers and carousers" is a bit of a stretch given that it has been quite a few years since any of this has been an issue. I mean, Barbara is married and to speak that way about a settled young woman with no evidence to back it is...dare I say it? Unnecessary.
Thanks for commenting, Terry - I like your blog so much, and I *virtually* like and respect you. :)
Okay, back to the Bush girls. Didn't mean to stir up controversy, I just meant to point out that the Bushettes have not been models of propriety. I mean, I wasn't slamming them - I meant that they have both been caught partying. I didn't call them falling down drunks, after all. I'm also inclined to think that if Chelsea had done it, it would have been all over the media. Also - I was doing grad work at Stanford when she was there, and no one had a bad word to say about her.
But that's neither here nor there. You're right, it isn't fair to compare them, and it's also true that they are in a fishbowl. I feel for you, Bushettes. I do. But in evidence, there is this:
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/jenna1.html
Here's an interesting article too:
http://www.slate.com/id/2154856/
Hmmm... Friendan wrote of the "silent problem" of women being depressed because they were 'only' housewives. I hate the idea that all women were uniformly unhappy and then feminism came along and saved everybody. I don't think that's what you're saying. But are women less depressed now? It seems like most of the women I know have Issues and take medication of some sort- lots of Xanex. I know mostly women with careers. The (very few) housewives that I know are not medicated. This is a very unscientific sample, though- I would love to see a study.
I certainly don't want to imply that ALL women were unhappy as housewives, and that feminism "saved" everyone. I'm sure that's not true. But certainly the world widened for many women who were unhappy - and more choices were available. Feminism also caused the incorporation of Title IX programs, helping a generation of girls experience athletics and improved fitness - this is now so part of the culture, we don't even notice, but I recall gym class before girls were encouraged! ( I also remember being discouraged from taking advanced math and science classes, but I was kind of down with that. Heh)
Betty Friedan herself admitted that her language was too strong when the movement was beginning. I often see that Christian anti-feminist sites use material from 1969 to make their points! The movement HAS changed, there is no doubt. I don't know anyone who thinks that raising children or being a stay at home mother is a waste of time - I think though that having the choice is important. I can tell you that, after a snow storm here in Seattle - cabin fever sets in when you know you can't get out. Sigh.
I personally find that EVERYONE is medicated these days - from housewives to nurses to lawyers. I sometimes feel I'm the rare person who has never been on an anti-depressant. But I guess there's still time...
Thanks for reading. ;)
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