Well, a lot of the marchers for NOW came out of the other human rights and protest movements of the time. They were often young women - sometimes with young families. Women who marched to end a war in Vietnam marched for women’s rights. Housewives were not (by and large) marching - they were getting divorced and getting jobs - or just changing their own awareness.
My mother, my mother in law and one of my best friend’s mothers are of the “NOW” generation. My mother graduated from high school in 1962. She was married with kids by the time the marching started (for that era of feminism) - her fight for “women’s rights” was getting my father to help around the house. My mother in law is ten years older - she’s an old hippie (Bob Dylan used to come over for coffee - not kidding, he used to hang at my in-laws house). But she was also married with kids by the time the marching started. Her contribution was kicking her husband out who wanted her to keep house for him and getting a full time job. My friends mother is about five years younger than my Mom - she was a anti-war marcher, a women’s rights marcher, a bra burner. My friend - as a baby a toddler - went along.
All three women did participate in women’s groups. None came from abusive households. They wanted to figure out what they were missing.
I was brought up to be deferential to men. In my profession, in general, women were the teachers and men were the administrators. Women were delicate and played half-court basketball and men played full-court basketball. A man could coach a woman’s team, but a woman couldn’t coach a male team. (When I brought this up with a principal, I was told it was none of my business.)
I don’t know how to tell you how ingrained this thinking was. You can still see it in the thinking of some of the men of the board when they fall into old patterns of thinking – and some women too.
In addition to teaching, I was doing some voluteer counseling at a center for street people in the early 1970s. There I met other volunteers active in other movements including the women’s movement. One friend took the time to work with me about how I saw myself as I related to men. I learned the most basic things like how to feel like a complete human being all by myself – without input from anyone. I still know women who don’t feel female unless they are with a male.
Keep in mind that I have a good marriage and I’m crazy about men. It just that I learned how to be me “all by myself” first.
That’s how it started for me. What I went through would benefit homemakers as well as women with careers. It’s all about respect. There were lots of men back then that were feminists too. Gender equality. Why not?
I would agree with this. My (not very educated) impression was that the big fem lib uptick in the sixties was mainly driven by:[ul]
[li]The spirit of the times - lots of long-standing ideas and rules were being overturned in fairly radical fashion and womens liberation/equality fitted in very well with the prevailing current[/li][li]After the struggle to get property rights and votes had succeeded, it became apparent in the fities that women were still getting the short end of the stick. So, womens activism moved on to equality in jobs, education pay, social mores etc.[/li][/ul]
Saying that PTSD (or WW2 in general) was the cause of womens lib in the sixties is a bit like saying that Peterloo led to the Labour party being formed - it was part of the background and context, but not a sole or proximate cause.
Yeah, but that’s basically because the ones in the unacceptable conditions (unacceptable by anybody who’s seen better ones) don’t have time for politics.
Or the “pushed to their limits” - which is what happened with the Civil Rights movement. Although Civil Rights leaders were generally well educated. Movements are generally led by those of privilege (education, wealth) - they become movements when they capture the imagination of those that have been exploited.