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Legally, things are better now.
Culturally, I think things are worse, maybe not than the 50s, but definitely openly worse than the 90s, and I think we are heading to the 1800s or worse in terms of women’s rights, because we can’t even say “women’s rights” without some TRA shouting “and LGBTQIAZNHYGRYSN! Pregnant PEOPLE! Birthing PARENT, you BIGOT!” If you can’t talk about a group of people, you can’t fight for them.
The internet has spread both right-winged and left-winged misogyny like one of those oil fires that burns under the surface for decades, and, combining general misogyny with porn and other things like trans ideology, has brought us to a point where we are actually in danger of backsliding horrifically. And it’s because the two sides have acted like small children squabbling over leftover birthday cake instead of like adults having real discussions. I do believe the religious right in the US built this fire, but the left has fed it with kindling for a long time, paying nothing but lip service to women.
And I am so angry I can’t even pretend to support any of them.
Personally, I think the answer is for women to take financial control by starting up businesses as fast as humanly possible, taking control of existing businesses, flooding the tech industry, media, education, etc. And then be prepared to defend that control. But the only way any of that will happen is if women help each other with things like childcare and all the other shit we are saddled with. I cannot believe how many of my friends have refused offers of help over the years, and had no interest in helping me when I needed help (although plenty have and I am so thankful for them). I don’t think the 4B movement is tenable, because I think it will backfire if it becomes too widespread, but that doesn’t mean women have no power. Form grassroots loan systems, help each other start businesses, form think tank groups with your friends, SUPPORT your friends in their efforts to start businesses (not MLMs natch, but soap businesses, accounting businesses, car detailing, etc.) and encourage them to start “masculine” and “feminine” businesses both.
/rant paused for now
I cannot believe how many friends have refused offers of help over the years
What is up with this? How do we overcome this? I am really trying to find ways to connect with other women for the exact reason you’ve stated—women overburdened with things like caretaking and everything else that just falls on us are in no way equipped to seize control as you’ve stated. But it seems like every woman wants to do everything herself and never accept assistance, while men will happily dump all over any woman.
I feel guilty accepting too much help from friends. My knee jerk reaction is to say no thank you— but then sometimes I reconsider and accept. I don’t want to be bothersome to people
For me, I tend to want things done a certain way. I admit I should accept help more often.
I don't know about doing everything herself, but I find I'm really irritated by the apathy of people around me. Both men and women. When I talk about the importance of fighting unjust housing laws or predatory moves by landlords, or men in women's prisons, or a variety of other topics, the response I mostly get from people is to "mind my own business." Sometimes they're pleasantly happy-yet-bemused about my ideas, but they usually don't make the connection of, "we should have class-based solidarity." And this is before you focus in on sex-based class solidarity. Most people's response, has always been, "I'm taking care of myself. And someone else will take care of others." And they really don't understand that they're idiots. I guess because they've never needed social safety nets, whereas I grew up needing those. Their stupid, simple, happy faces. I guess it's that or lose your mind if you find out what's really going on and how much injustice there really is.
I do not know. It doesn’t make sense to me.
Might it be because they don't want to burden other women, and/or become reliant on help that might be withdrawn at any time? Or that they don't think they'll ever be able to return the favour? It reminds me a bit of the talk about networking decades ago - to me there was no point, because it wouldn't have been reciprocal. I was in jobs with no career path and would never have been in a position to assist anyone in the workplace.
Why do you think the 4B movement will backfire?
I'll tell you why.
Men are physically stronger than us. This is a critical factor in how things play out. When you read the Bible, the Koran, the Vedas, Buddhist scripture, etc... and it tells you women are evil and shouldn't have rights, it was a journey to get there. Women have been religious leaders, business owners, forgers, scribes, etc... in history. Women in Afghanistan were part of parliament, dressed normally and not in blue ghost sheets.
What happened?
Men are physically stronger. And they are willing to blow shit up in a way women aren't.
The reality is that if someone doesn't want to respect your choices, they don't have to unless there is an opposing force capable of stopping them. Just like the Ukraine saying, "we don't want to be part of you," to Russia, is not enough. Unfortunately that's not how the world works.
These days it’s WAY more about them being willing to blow shit up. (And supported in physical violence by society and government.)
Just my two cents.
Every time women have pushed, men have pushed back harder. There may be no greater push than 4B. If it went widespread, the pushback could result in something like Afghanistan.
With rare exception, any man on this planet could kill any woman on this planet with his bare hands. We will never achieve parity, but making progress in that direction is always better than not. If we can manage to keep our pushes just slightly ahead of their pushbacks, we can live good lives.
It's shocking to think about the life my mother was born into and how much better her life would've been if she'd been born 20 years later. She wasn't even allowed to attend college (by her conservative family, not by law), was forced to marry her high school boyfriend because she'd gotten pregnant, wasn't allowed contraceptives at all during their marriage, was left in poverty after their divorce, etc.
This was interesting to read. My mother would have been in her 90s now if she were still alive and I know how lucky I am that she was my mom. She went to college against her parents' wishes. She and my dad always seemed like equal partners to me when I was young, but looking back, I think she seemed to perhaps in charge of much of our household. She and my father insisted that my sister and I went to college and that we could do whatever we wanted.
Like others of my age (70s), I encountered plenty of misogyny along the way. But I was also lucky to grow up in a town that actively supported girls sports in the 1960s and 1970s. It was a mixed bag, but my parents and others gave me confidence.
Many of the laws at the time sucked and much of the culture was bad. I wouldn't call it the good old days (except for a few things not related to women's rights).
Whenever I have the opportunity, I relay information about those old laws to college aged students I work with. They seem to be astounded and can't imagine any reversal.
While I think most things are better, the rise of porn and basic internet scrap has made some things worse.
This was very good. I'm 57 and was very aware of the hard work of the second wave feminists and Betty Friedan's influence. I'm sickened and dismayed to see women embracing the trad lifestyle and denouncing feminism. We've barely had most of our rights for one generation. Women didn't even have the vote when my grandmother was born in 1918. Things are very precarious and young women can't or won't see it.
I agree it's an issue but it's not just a quirk of the younger generation. Plenty of the worst handmaidens are older women. I've met many of them that talk about the good old days, that pretend misogyny is over, that refuse to listen to the younger generations, that center men like they're precious baby boys and that modern women are simply "lazy sluts/temptresses" making the world worse. Not necessarily that young women can't or won't see it, 4b is evidence many young women are unhappy with the way things are, especially in very handmaiden-heavy cultures like SK where mothers will treat daughters like a consolation prize or burden. It's tough to know wtf is going on when there's so little "sex consciousness" and role-models. And mainstream feminism is not good leadership, but that's the first contact many women will have with it.
Through my work I interact with a lot of women in their late 60s/early 70s, and you're totally right about so many of the being the worst handmaidens. There are kickass women in the same age range who know how good they have it thanks to feminism, but if I had a penny for every older woman who wants to pull up the ladder behind her, I'd be able to pay off my student loans.
Exactly. I mean obviously there are "opponents" to feminist movements in every gen. They make headlines now partially for human interest reasons and partially to manipulate the narrative. In the past many of them would've died unknown (for the very reason that they were quiet, 'trad' homemakers, not making social waves.)
That doesn't mean that "current young women don't know how bad it is" compared to other generations. Such a broad statement like that is ego or fear driven rather than useful or educational.
And "pulling up the ladder" is definitely something I've experienced. That's just an obvious human experience, as long as there are humans there will be people who are competitive, resentful, fearful and resource-guarding (no matter how many resources they get), influenced by their own trauma in a maladaptive way, narcissistic, etc. There has not been a generation of women fully united against men, or at least on the same page of feminism. If there had been, the present would look different right now.
I've noticed that, in my personal experience, far more older women than younger will handwave away sexual harassment by claiming that women just need to either take it as a compliment or give the man a slap. It's frustrating.
I've seen that a lot too. Framed in both ways that it's not a big deal and that either way it's on you instead of the man. Definitely a lot of "hush we don't want to hear about this" from some older women. Handmaidens in particular programmed their brains to think the most peace they'll get is by prioritizing and appeasing men (which is wrong, but when you reinforce a mentality for years obviously most people are too tired to make big changes and it doesn't bode well for teaching the younger gens).
It's very disappointing and makes me feel reluctant about opening up or talking about male harassment to older women until I feel reasonably confident that they won't do this to be honest. It's gutting to work up the courage to talk about something only to have the experience trivialised.
I've noticed that some older women in the media have also expressed this kind of 'toughen up or take it as a compliment' attitude and it makes me so frustrated.
This rings true to both my experience (I graduated from high school in 1971, and am now 71), and my mother's (she died two years ago at age 96). I feel fortunate to have entered college at the time feminism was entering the academy (I took a literature, a psychology, and a sociology course all focused on women, with women professors), and at a time of changing laws and opportunities for women, thanks to second wave feminism. My mother, who had a job as an elementary school teacher, also took to feminism in the 1970s like a duck takes to water, and after 30 years of marriage to my abusive and mentally ill father divorced him. She loved her freedom, her independence, and her autonomy, and she made the most of her new, single life. She traveled, skied, joined book clubs and societies (the Humanist Society, the Skeptics), and supported a woman's right to choose.
I was lucky to be born when I was, but she was courageous, having been born when she was (1926). I had the advantages of a changing culture and laws; she had none of that when she was my age, and had been conditioned by a culture that demeaned women and in which male supremacy was simply "the way it was."
It's not that I skated through on the changes. In college, as a freshman, I had a male professor to whom I went for advice about a major tell me that it didn't matter what I majored in because I would just get married and have children (I earned a PhD and became a tenured professor). At the job I held in college I I had to argue that all tasks should be open to the female employees. There was condescension and a refusal to take women seriously as students, scholars, workers, human beings and to treat them as equal to men. My own father told me he thought it was "good your husband lets you have your own opinions."
As for the current devaluiing of feminism, I think perhaps that, like democracy, when you grow up enjoying certain rights, you can't even imagine what life can be without them.
My story is like yours, except I was lucky to have a kind and loving father.
Mainly because our moms sound so alike, except that mine was born a few years earlier and died in 2004.
We had the usual mother-daughter battles post-adolescence and, I regret to say, many years beyond. But the love was always there.
Only now, in my dotage, do I fully appreciate my good fortune in having been born when I was, and her lack of same.
And how much I wish that she had been able to live in the world that I did. Truly, I think she would’ve made far more of the advantages than I ever did.
I wish with every fiber of my being that I had told her that.
You sound like a good daughter and I bet your mother knew how you felt.
My mom too. She was born in 1922 and told me she wished she had been born in my generation instead because women were getting rights. But my dad was also pro-women's rights too. My dad didn't wear the pants in the family, my mom did so she did what she wanted on a personal level.