Were things in the past really that bad for women? (yelling, relatives)
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Birth control was readily available when I was 17.
I went to work for General Motors when I was 19, making me one of the highest paid workers in the Valley (including some men). While employed I was in the union, if I was unfairly treated it was my fault, but I wasn't because I spoke up.
I married young (somebody should have stopped THAT) but I kept working, paying for my horses, and the marriage peacefully ended five years later .
I'm pretty sure the Op's question is dependent upon who they are asking from the Era.
I was raised on a farm and dad had a wrench in my hands before mom got a frying pan in it. That means I didn't take much spit from anyone and finding good employment or getting a loan to buy something was not an issue --- getting a loan also meant and still means one pays the loan back on time --- something either gender can excel or fail at
Birth control was readily available when I was 17.
I went to work for General Motors when I was 19, making me one of the highest paid workers in the Valley (including some men). While employed I was in the union, if I was unfairly treated it was my fault, but I wasn't because I spoke up.
I married young (somebody should have stopped THAT) but I kept working, paying for my horses, and the marriage peacefully ended five years later .
I'm pretty sure the Op's question is dependent upon who they are asking from the Era.
I was raised on a farm and dad had a wrench in my hands before mom got a frying pan in it. That means I didn't take much spit from anyone and finding good employment or getting a loan to buy something was not an issue --- getting a loan also meant and still means one pays the loan back on time --- something either gender can excel or fail at
Definitely. One woman's experience doesn't speak for all women. We have many different stories.
I remember the lives my mom and those of my friends around us and yes they were expected even if they worked outside of home to, clean and cook. None of the dads in the neighborhood cooked nor cleaned the house. When it came to vacations or travel it was whatever my dad decided.
Yes there are many different experiences but as a whole women did not have better lives, work opportunities nor pay.
Feminists always talk about how horrible it was for women in the past. Now I am talking say 40s, 50s, 60s or so. I know there is a history forum but I would like to hear some thoughts from women who have first-hand experience. Was it really as bad as feminists say it was for women? Would you say it was Afghanistan/Saudi Arabia bad?
The problem was that the quality of a woman's life was almost 100% dependent on the caliber and disposition of the man she ended up being married to. If you married to a decent, essentially kind man capable of earning a living wage, the average woman probably was satisfied, even happy, with her life during those decades. However, women with a cruel, abusive, or tyrannical man might as well have been serving a life sentence in a prison with invisible bars, sometimes wrought with physical peril, with death of the warden the only hope of release. If she married a man incapable of earning a living wage she was trapped in a life of poverty. A woman in those days was never afforded true adult status, and since most people often crave to control their own destiny, it could be very frustrating. Women who had no desire for men sexually or to be a mother were probably miserable and probably had a tendency to spread their misery.
There are always people who wilt under a society's cultural mores and always it is a dance between the good of most of a society and the good of individuals who either don't or can't benefit from those perimeters. My female relatives were quite happy with their lot in life those days, most of the military officer's wives, who still lived that life until the last decade, whom I encountered were happy. But I also met some that were miserable and felt there was no escape.
What I have seen through decades as a teacher, though, leads me to believe strongly that children were better off when a woman's only "real" job was being a good wife and mother. Not to mention we got rocket science caliber teachers in our schools for "little woman mad money" pay. Not fair for individual woman, but better for society.
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As a male I was appalled to learn in my MBA Business Law class in 1980, that in some states women could not sign a legal document if their husband was in the same room. They were judged as being too weak to make a decision in the presence of their husbands.
Women were barred from many professions until WWII when there were not enough men left in the US to fill critical jobs. After the War women were once again forced out of these jobs!
Even today some women are content to be a silent servant which diminishes all the gains women have made toward equality (note; I said toward equality as it hasn't happened yet) and this complacency or timidity completely baffles me.
I do agree with Oldhag1 that having a dedicated parent heavily involved in the raising of children offers advantages to all of society. But it doesn't have to be a female parent, and it doesn't have to be a non-working parent. Just an involved, loving, and caring parent.
When I got home from school, Mom was in the kitchen singing, and it smelled like apple pie in there. She seemed pretty contented. Nowadays, moms think they are very lucky if they have the leisure to bake a pie. You know -- somehow women these days don't really seem to be all that contented. In fact, most that I know are angry as hell, living empty lives, getting pleasure only from Rx drugs. Their children are strangers, their husbands their enemy if they are present at all.
When I went to my friends' house after school, their moms were happy, too. What went wrong?
It was terrible. Women stayed home and took care of their children. If they didn't have children they had to prepare meals, play bridge, read, and do all sorts of degrading things. They were treated as second-class people. Men and boys opened doors for them, lit their cigarettes, took off their hats in their presence, and even called them ma'am. Eighty percent didn't know enough to get a divorce and become single mothers.
...you've watched a lot of movies, I'll say that for you.
I think it also depended on your state of residence. I had to live on campus during undergraduate school. Men could live off campus. We had to wear dresses to class. (Except for gym) Men never had to wear dresses LOL.
Early on I couldn’t have a credit card without my husbands signature-even though I was working,making the higher salary, and putting him through grad school. Tradespeople wanted the “husbands” ok before starting work/repair. Might have been different if I wasn’t married—I don’t know. BC pills were not easily available— you had to be married. Our bank accounts have always been joint so I don’t remember disparities there. I know that my parents set up my first bank/savings account—maybe it had to be approved by my dad.
Feminists always talk about how horrible it was for women in the past. Now I am talking say 40s, 50s, 60s or so. I know there is a history forum but I would like to hear some thoughts from women who have first-hand experience. Was it really as bad as feminists say it was for women? Would you say it was Afghanistan/Saudi Arabia bad?
Of course it wasn't Saudi Arabia bad, women did not get beaten or executed for wearing the wrong thing. But it was almost impossible for women to be self-supporting. When my mom had to go to work after my dad suffered a TBI in 1967, she pretty much had a choice of secretary, housekeeper, all low pay jobs. Even nursing was low pay then. Our grandfather had to subsidize our rent even with her working full time (secretary).
I work in geriatric rehab. I had a patient in her late 70's who was an attorney. She told me how long and hard it was for her to get a job after graduating, as women were very few in law. She said on interviews they would ask her if she was on birth control (they were allowed to then, and they were allowed to say "we don't hire women of child bearing age". She ended up working for the state because no private law firm would hire her.
If a woman got pregnant, she was out the door immediately regardless of the job, whether married or not. Perfectly legal to get fired for that.
I have had many patients over the years who had no choice but to stay in horrible marriages, some where they were abused, because they had no options to support themselves if they left. If a woman called police after a beating they'd ask the woman what SHE did to cause him to hit her. When women were raped, they'd call every man she ever dated to testify whether or not she was a loose woman, and if so, the rapist would get off. Sometimes they'd get off because her skirt was too short when she got raped so it was her fault.
Women were not even able to get credit in their own name until maybe late 70's or so. There is an All in the Family episode where Edith tries to get a credit card, and they say no, that they need her husbands permission.
Societies priorities were different. Prioritiies for men and women were focused on family, not jobs. The roles suited what the PRIORITIES were.
That said, women could work if they wanted to, they have for hundreds of years. I suggest reading Pioneer Girl, a research volume that details -- and I mean painstaking detail -- the life of Laura Ingalls Wilder and all the people she encountered in her life. Almost ALL the women worked, homesteaded, owned shops, etc. Her sisters both worked. One was a telegraph operator, and her daughter was a writer. Her sister in law homesteaded 160 acres as a single women, living alone.
The idea that women were always treated like garbage is beyond false. It's a myth, a narrative to sell the idea that men are bad. women are good to younger and younger generations as they get further and further away from the truth.
Today's feminism is a horrific twisting of history. For example: Women in this country did not want the right to vote. The vocal minority that was pushing women's right to vote had a very difficult time getting enough women on board to make the issue ... well .. an issue. Women's views were the same as their husbands because they married people that had the same values, so they felt their voices were heard. Which never happens today, which is why there is so much divorce. Add in that voting was tied to conscription -- getting called to serve in the army -- and women did NOT want that responsibility.
It's a myth, a shame, a way to cause fights, arguments, problems, anger, and create victims. It's a disgrace. And trying to discuss this with today's feminist ultimately devolves into them yelling... Because Patriarchy!!!! at you. No reasoning, no substance, no knowledge of history. Just yelling.
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