The Problem That Has No Name (Group 7)

Paragraphs 1-5: Celina Cheung

Women have always had a predetermined, already set role given by the perception of the greater society. Friedan strongly expresses in this excerpt how American women would think about all the opportunities they are missing out on whether it is to achieve a greater education, job or to obtain political rights instead of having to be identified as a suburban wife that only does housework, take care of her children and to be feminine with her husband. Most American women in the 20th century believe that they are missing out on all the opportunities to achieve equality-one example would be given the opportunity to be in the masculine work force, jobs including to be president or a doctor. But experts have ingrained into American women’s minds in the 20th century- predominantly even until the end of 1950s, that being truly feminine and devoting their lives to looking after their husband and having children all their life was more admirable and praiseworthy. Women in the 20th century were getting engaged when they were teenagers because they believed that it was only normal to identify as a wife and mother in American society. There was no sense of independency and not many opportunities for American women in the twentieth century to be able to achieve their own dreams. Following the norm of being the kin keeper and the role of a mother and wife is the only way they would be worthy.

This ties into the social phenomenon in contemporary society today because although this excerpt focuses on American women, this situation still exists in third world countries that lack resources and live in poor working conditions. There are some women in third world countries that do still get married when they are teens and on top of that also even bearing children because that is what the norms is still in third world countries. Women do all the child bearing, cleaning and satisfy their husbands while the husbands work for the family. In poor countries girls are forced to only work and be feminine in society, they don’t have a chance for advanced education or even looking for jobs that they hope to do because the only work they could do was housework, child care and being a good wife. This phenomenon shows how although inequality with women has improved in most parts of the world, there are still third world countries that have this clear divide in what women and men’s roles are that follow Friedan’s idea on how women were only seen as being home while men were given the opportunity for more education and is able to work in the modern contemporary society today.

Comment by Rita Qiao Li: I agree that although the discriminatory environment for women who live in developed countries has been largely improved, this phenomenon still exists in the third world countries. Many of the women in those undeveloped poor countries still suffer from other people's view of feminity that they should be obedient to men and only play the roles of wives and mothers. They are not allowed to work and achieve higher education and deemed as inferior to men. This has largely denied women's rights to their own choices and freedom, leading to the part of the reason why we can barely see women playing important roles in the workplace. However, it is not true that women are inferior to men, and this view must be eradicated to the point that they will be given the same rights as men do.

Paragraphs 6-8: Yansong Li

      Fredien gives specific examples reflecting that women in the 1950s centre their lives around kitchen, housework, and pleasing their husband. With the influence of newspaper, magazine, and drugstore ads, being a good house wife as the dream life-image is cherished and deeply rooted in women's mind. Girls would not even study physics during the space race with Soviet Union because it is considered "unfeminine". True feminine fulfillment is the dream. Women are proud to be housewives and this kind of thoughts and division of labour still exist in contemporary society.

Paragraphs 9-11: David An

For over fifteen years, women always focused on how to pleasure their husbands and took care of the house work. The division of labor within the household is very different for men and women, not because a very sex is superior than the other but they are just fundamentally different. This problematic phenomenon promotes an idea that women were born to take care of the responsibilities within a family where men make more essential decisions for the family. The content of the conversation is very different for men and women. Women focuses on their families and men get to talk about politics or other social issues. In the 1950s and 1960s, women tend to blame themselves or their marriages when they have problems. They would think why other women are satisfied with their lives while they can’t. Discussing the problem with the husband would be meaningless while the husband cannot really understand the problem. In fact, for those women who have problems, they themselves may not know what’s wrong. They tend to overlook the problem as they kept telling themselves that there’s nothing wrong really. With the ideology of gender equality in mind, nowadays, women start to notice the problem of their husbands and children are not the only thing they have. Along with getting on average significantly more education than in the 1950s, women now are able to recognize the existence of the problem which they refuse to admit back in the 50s and 60s.