Posted on 10/24/2009 9:29:31 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
"The woman's movement wasn't about happiness." That judgment, attributed to feminist Susan Faludi, seems to be the blunt assessment shared by many other women. As numerous recent studies now indicate, a remarkably large percentage of women describe themselves as increasingly unhappy.
This issue came to light last month in a fascinating essay by Maureen Dowd of The New York Times. Dowd, whose columns often reveal the nation's Zeitgeist, cited the fact that a number of major studies indicate that "women are getting gloomier and men are getting happier." She asked: "Did the feminist revolution end up benefiting men more than women?"
A very similar set of questions arises from TIME magazine's current cover story and special report, "The State of the American Woman." As the cover of the magazine explains, "A new poll shows why they are more powerful - but less happy."
Reporter Nancy Gibbs traces the vast changes brought about by the feminist revolution. "It's funny how things change slowly, until the day we realize they've changed completely," she observes. As she documents, these changes are easily visible in contemporary America:
In 1972 only 7% of students playing high school sports were girls; now the number is six times as high. The female dropout rate has fallen in half. College campuses used to be almost 60-40 male; now the ratio has reversed, and close to half of law and medical degrees go to women, up from fewer than 10% in 1970. Half the Ivy League presidents are women, and two of the three network anchors soon will be; three of the four most recent Secretaries of State have been women.
Along the way, Gibbs also traces more fundamental changes. With remarkable understatement she simply notes "the detachment of marriage and motherhood" among other transformations. "Women no longer view matrimony as a necessary station on the road to financial security or parenthood," she explains.
Nevertheless, "Among the most confounding changes of all is the evidence, tracked by numerous surveys, that as women have gained more freedom, more education and more economic power, they have become less happy."
Gibbs cites a growing body of research that documents this trend toward unhappiness. In "The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness," [pdf file] published in the American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, economists Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers explain that women in the 1970s "reported higher subjective well-being than did men." Now, the opposite is the case.
The big question raised by these studies is this: Has feminism produced unhappiness among women? That question is inescapable when seen in light of the historical context. The great transformation of society by feminism took shape only after the 1970s. As a political and social movement, feminism has been stunningly successful. In the span of a single generation, the society has been overwhelmingly transformed. But, over the same period, women report themselves less happy, especially as compared to men.
As Gail Collins notes in her new book, When Everything Changed: The Amazing Journey of American Women from 1960 to the Present, the pace of this transformation has been absolutely stunning. "The cherished convictions about women and what they could do were smashed in the lifetime of many of the women living today," she observes. "It happened so fast that the revolution seemed to be over before either side could really find its way to the barricades."
Nevertheless, Collins, also a columnist for The New York Times, concluded: " The feminist movement of the late 20th century created a new United States in which women ran for president, fought for their country, argued before the Supreme Court, performed heart surgery, directed movies, and flew into space. But it did not resolve the tensions of trying to raise children and hold down a job at the same time."
These tensions have erupted as flash points in our national conversation over recent years. Some feminists have accused women who decide to stay home with their children as "letting down the team." Gail Collins cites Marlyn McGrath Lewis, director of undergraduate admissions at Harvard University as saying, "It really does raise this question for all of us and for the country: when we work so hard to open academics and other opportunities for women, what kind of return do we expect to get for that?"
The essays by Maureen Dowd and Nancy Gibbs both raise the fundamental question of feminism - Has it led to greater unhappiness among women? Dowd and Gibbs remain committed feminists. Nevertheless, as Dowd notes, feminism has served to increase the burdens upon women, even as it promised to open doors.
Sadly, most feminists seem incapable, given their ideological commitments, of asking the hardest questions. "Progress is seldom simple," Gibbs explains, "it comes with costs and casualties, even challenges about whether a change represents an advance or a retreat."
In reality, feminism was never only about opening doors for women. In order to make the case for the vast social transformation that feminism has produced, the feminist movement aspired to nothing short of a total social, moral, and cultural revolution. Along the way, feminism redefined womanhood, marriage, motherhood, and the roles for both men and women.
Nevertheless, it appears that most women are uncomfortable with this total package. Instead of producing a vast expansion of happiness among women, the feminist movement must now answer for the fact that women, by their own evaluation, appear to be less happy than before the revolution.
The reason for this is probably quite simple. Women are in the best position to evaluate, not only what feminism has gained, but what it has lost. Maybe Susan Faludi is right - The women's movement wasn't about happiness. Adapted from R. Albert Mohler Jr.'s weblog at www.albertmohler.com.
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R. Albert Mohler, Jr. is president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. For more articles and resources by Dr. Mohler, and for information on The Albert Mohler Program, a daily national radio program broadcast on the Salem Radio Network, go to www.albertmohler.com
Why are so many women unhappy?
They haven’t met me.
Penis envy! (Ducks and runs for cover...)
bump
Because they are being stretched too thin.
Society expects them to find a career AND raise healthy, happy babies. The rare woman can manage both and remain content herself.
See. You shouldn’t fool with Mother Nature.
the feminist movement was about socializing women
towards the establishment of a one world government.
Dear Ms.Dowd: Just because Michael Douglas is always smiling.You shouldn’t take any inference for that.
Because women have found out the big lie of the Feminazi’s was h***.
they tried to turn women into men. And guess what being a women is work enough.
Women did’t need to take on the role of men too.
WOMEN ARE TIRED.
Women want men who are confident leaders.
Women want control in a relationship and now view being submissive to a man as a bad thing.
Consequently, if the woman gets control, then she is unhappy because her man is not leading and his confidence is shaken. She will despise him.
And if the woman doesn’t get control, instead of being happy that her man is a confident leader, she feels slighted and ignored. And sinks into self pity and becomes angry at her man.
Women have set up a no win situation, where they are going to be unhappy regardless of what the man does.
By the way, I do NOT advocate that women should go back to the way it was. The biggest thing I had issue with before the ‘revolution’ of women’s rights were the lack of choice (I don’t mean abortion).
I feel women should be able to CHOOSE to do what they want with their lives. But I also think it’s unreasonable to expect that you can have ‘everything’.
Miserable spawn of the deluded sixties generation, who could’ve predicted this?
You mean killing your babies, sleeping with hundreds of men, trying to act like men and being a communist doesn’t make you happy?
When I was in junior high school, I used to babysit for several families with small children. All of the mothers got together and formed a “women’s consciousness raising” group, which, as far as I could tell, meant little more than sitting around and complaining about men in general and husbands in particular. Every single one of those marriages ended in divorce.
Well DUH! Men now don’t have to carry the whole responsiblity of bringing home the money, they aren’t on the hook for any unintended children anymore, and if they get bored it’s completely ok to just walk away from their family and take off with the hot 20 something he met at work who pays attention to them. How does any of this benefit women? Women now are expected to work 40 hours, keep the home and kids fed, if they get pregnant before being married are expeccted to get rid of the child, and usually have the major responsiblity of picking up the pieces if the hubby walks out on them. Feminism gave women the shot end of the stick IMHO! I very happy though but then I don’t work outside the home. We don’t have every new doodad coming down the pike, don’t have a 4,000 SF home nor new cars, but is that stuff really necessary for happiness? Not in my opinion.
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Obama Says A Baby Is A Punishment
Obama: “If they make a mistake, I don’t want them punished with a baby.”
The unhappy,bitter women I have met are almost ALWAYS liberal.
Deep down,these liberal women want a rugged,conservative man but they would never admit it publically.
This is one of the primary reasons liberal women loathe Sarah Palin. They are jealous of her husband.
That’s far too confusing. I’ll just keep doing what I’ve been doing and let them fight it out amongst themselves.
Only a man would invent the theory of penis envy.
The ONLY time I wished I had one of those attachments was when I was stuck in an elevator and the guy I was with could have relieved himself rather easily and I could not.
I think we women, being smaller, weaker, and nurturing, were made to be protected and taken care of by men. Unfortunately when a man doesn’t fulfill the obligation (frequently because women give away their trump card) then we have to fend for ourselves - which goes against our nature for the most part.
LOL
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