Been kinda quiet...
I know, I know.. I haven't written much as of late. As with many Steemians, it is one of those things that happens. For me, it happened right away. I don't have a problem with the platform and it isn't an issue with anything in particular. Sometimes the world is just a difficult place. Madness really. It is amazing at how the world works, at least in the western American culture.
For those that are abroad, I would assume there is a shit show that goes along with gender all over the place. I mean, we have specific problems here in America such as unrealistic expectations that we have placed upon our self and that we in turn willingly accept. Some of these beliefs we turn inward, adopting them, no matter how toxic they are.
A Toxic Culture By Any Other Name is Still a Toxic Culture
As a woman coming from generation X, well the tail end, technically not of it at all. I was born in 1980, so I missed it by a hair. Whatever generation then, that that makes me part of, it too seems to be on this crux. On one hand, we grew up being told that we could be anything. I imagine that a young Hilary Clinton was told that she could be president one day, or an astronaut. You see, they told me these things, and I am sure they said it to the generation before, just like they continued to say it after. My point is, we were told that we could do anything. Then they raised us to be ladies.
Public school taught us to be quiet, embrace a demure life, cook and cleaning for your husband is important because, "After all, cleanliness is next to godliness!". We were told to value marriage and parenting, to not have sex till we were older, better yet, wait till we were married. Our roles as women have been shaped for us and we have been spoon fed expectations since were still on the breast.
Insert Disclaimer for the Potential Objections to Follow
Granted, men have also a long list of expectations. Why people seem to assume that women are the only ones that have to conform, or worse, that because I (as a woman) have something to say about gender equality that I automatically am going to ignore or forget about the other nearly 50% of the population, is asinine. As a heterosexual female, I love men. As a human that values different perspectives and someone more likely to help me with physical things that I can't personally do, I appreciate men. This rant is not about men. Though, if the men reading this care to stick around, they may gain an understanding of my perspective and they are free to engage in conversation.
Back to Us Ladies
The typical normative for women was culturally developed in America in the 1950s, post World War II (WWII). Gender roles had been challenged by the lack of men two generations earlier in World War I, when women stepped up to do work that was once only okay for the males. But they weren't there during the war. Things needed to get done and so the ladies stepped up.
Never mind the fact that industrial America and a few key private industries that fueled the wartime efforts, women were allowed to go to work out the home. Then the men came back. The WWI women mostly went back home when their men came back and their daughters were alive during this time to see WWII happen. These daughters grew up and they put their efforts into the war effort, with similar reactions from the culture. Women who worked, especially munition jobs that paid decently, weren't often liked by local women.
Men, the owners of companies, they weren't willing at first to accept women. However, by 1945 women began working outside of the house. This was a difficult adjustment, but these women often were happy to be helping. They accepted less money than men while working in factories and other wartime efforts. They also kept the farms running, took professional jobs such as doctors and lawyers. Over 3,000 women enlisted in the military and were allowed to fly, they were nurses and they joined some of the first women only units.
Women still had to act the part of a lady, be dressed, act morally and be prettied up. All of this they had to maintain while working long hours and sometimes being a single parent to their offspring. Granted, kids took on the role of parents in many cases, taking on the lion's share of responsibility for younger siblings. The daughters doing this had would be impacted by experiencing this shift of responsibility as well as the lack of parental influence, but we will get to this generation in a while.
Focusing on the women who were working during the war, which ended in the mid 1940s were asked to quit their jobs when the war ended and the men came back. As expected, many of them did not want to give up their job. Estimated totals of women that tried to keep their jobs was around 3/4 of the women with jobs. Most of these women ended up fired and out of work. Those that worked before the war, often the more poor of ladies that needed money before they had a financially sound wartime job, these women were forced to go back to domestic jobs. Most women had to welcome their husband's home while plastering on a smile about being back home with the kids.
As you might guess, the transition for women going home was not easy. While men didn't want to admit it at the time, the gender landscape had already changed.
Women in a Post-War Era
Many of the changes during the second world war were permanent. Men, relatively universally, opposed prohibition earlier in the 1900s. It was the same in the later years, as women were struggling to work and now, today, when women struggle still about their jobs and how much they make.
Once upon a time, there was a need for the split shifts with women at home and men at work. One could argue that this is not a fair and balanced distribution of power. Inherently with this restriction, it causes men to have to work and go outside of the home and women to stay home. It assumes that this is what all women and men want. It does not take the individual needs of the people doing these tasks into account. Feminists will often say that they want equality for women.
The suffragettes seeking the right to vote in the 20s said that they wanted to change the dynamic. Men mostly fought this. For some reason, seemingly, there were a large number of people who wanted to keep the status quo alive.
Flash Forward 10 Years
Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) took a forward stance where women are regarded, both during the war and after. He saw that men would need to be guaranteed their jobs before they went to war (and what allowed women to be able to work because it was clear that companies intended to hire men back when they were no longer needed during the war), and so he did. After the war, there was a strong push from the government to encourage women in the home.
Women, in the 1950s who were forced back into the home, to do a job that they didn't feel right for, that they didn't want to do or that they didn't feel comfortable doing, caused a rift between the sexes to a level that we hadn't seen before in history. before this, women didn't know what they were capable of. To be fair, this means that men didn't know what they were capable of either. These men, returning from a relatively atrocious war, after nuclear weapons had been dropped, and after seeing things happen that they weren't prepared for were also expected to just happily go back to work. One could argue that a more free schedule that could be done in the home vs. working a 9-5 would have been better for many of these men. Having time with their children and for that to be socially acceptable, that could have provided healing for men. Some men, not all, quite possibly could have been healed, seeing their children, being close to their family and remembering what they went to war for in the first place. But no. We often focus on the disenfranchised female. Of course she was and since it is so obvious, that doesn't make it alright. But there were men as well that were equally disenfranchised.
By the time all was said and done, the landscape had permanently changed and the marriage roles that made up the gender roles were no longer valid. But no one paid attention. Well, not a lot of people did and for years the gap of wages has maintained to be unequal, women have been put down for wanting to work and it is socially acceptable to have bitterness towards the opposite sex.
Beyond the government, outside influences had their own weight with women in regards to shaping their minds, bodies and purpose. It would be some time that men and women both from America were to be ushered along by the burgeoning television influence as well as government and paper media outlets, to be the woman they were born to be.
During the 50s, a strong influence on the hanging landscape of cultural gender roles were the advertising firms. They would advertise wares to housewives, often preaching about how a woman should behave or that "good women" do this or that. The mostly men copywriters would have an ideal in their mind and then they would not only hock their products, but they were selling what it meant to be an American.
This meant taking a less predominant role in the workforce and shuffling back home to the children. The women who were shooed back to the kitchen had been influenced at a mighty ideal time. These changes seemed natural for many at the time. Men, of course, deserved to have their jobs and while women didn't want to take their spouses jobs, they did want independence and money of their own. They had a taste of both the satisfaction and financial freedom that came with working. Thus, the gender gap was fueled even more as the years went on. Women who were non-conforming to the home were placed in institutions and men, with their own anger and bitterness, not fully recovered from the likely PTSD of war, they were placed in a workforce and allowed to be physically violent and dismissive.
This went on for years and even today, over 50 years later we still feel the burn.
Modern Times Mean Modern Measures
Jumping from the mid to late 1950s to the present is a huge jump. As technology increases at a nearly exponential rate, there is an increased of understanding that surpasses the growth gaps in the past. That being said, the amount of change is almost irrelevant. That is, and let me please explain, when WWII ended, the roles of women and men changed so dynamically, as well as the reasons for the roles that existed. Before both WWI and WWII, women had the job to be predominantly at home.
They were the caregivers and the children were, like the home, under the purview of women's work. Men, would work outside and they enjoyed certain freedoms. The idea that men were made for being out in the world had worked well (namely for men) for so long, it just made sense. Now, however, there was a world that had been opened to women. Like most things you can't put the cork back in that bottle. You can't unopen the door.
The men and the government, essentially wanted to turn back time. as nice as that would be, the technology simply isn't a thing (yet, that we know of). So, rather than conforming and communicating, men asserted their dominance in a number of ways.
Women didn't entirely agree on what equal or fair was either. For some it meant having a choice, others it meant working together and others it meant being able to express yourself. Unfortunately, there was no hard line on how to act. There was how you should act and how you rebelled. Recognize this pin up model? She was able to express herself but at the same time she was making fun of women in the ad.
The Battle Rages On
Once, women were called to work out of duty. Now, they generally work because it is a requirement. The only one that has won in this discord between the sexes is large corporations that have a more competitive workforce and that have benefited from the slighted feelings of both genders. The government has been able to fuel wars through our personal hatred and while it continues, we, the people will continue to be the ones that suffer.
Women and men both suffer when we can't work together. Equality means equal rights for each individual. It isn't hating another because of their gender, paying them less, talking down to them, delegating unwanted duties or setting each other up for failure when matching with expectations that don't fit the individual. These injustices effect our work lives, family, interpersonal and so many other relationships. It could be argued that the inadequacies are what lead to insecurities in romantic relationships, the turning to pornography and technology to satisfy sexuality and the lack of understanding between men and women. As long as we are not getting along or seeing eye to eye, those that do not have our best interests at heart remain above, with the ability and perception to drag us all along by our noses.
It's time to wake up, educate, listen and communicate. Together, we are stronger.
References
There is a lot to sift through and women's rights are not easy to navigate. This is namely because the many facets of the issue and how singular changes provoked intense changes that are still vibrating through our timeline. As you begin to get familiar with the broader issue, the modern concerns of women and men about their equalities and freedoms become easier to understand. I encourage you to read, discuss and share this (and other articles like it) in order to broaden the conversation. In the end, arguing is not a solution. The only way to come to a conclusion and to find a potential compromise for the majority is through education, perception and understanding. You can find out more about certain topics in this article by following on to the following pages...
Detailed Timeline for Women's Rights
Gender Roles in Post War America
Women, Post WWI / 1950s Construction through Culture
