The Problem That Has No Name By Betty Friedan

Friedan, however, was no ordinary housewife. Before starting her family, she had worked as a newspaper reporter; even after her children came, she wrote regularly for the major women 's magazines. By 1957 she was fed up with the endless stories about breast-feeding, the preparation of gourmet chip dips, and similar domestic fare that was the staple of ‘Redbook‘, ‘McCall 's‘, and ‘Ladies ' Home Journal‘. She had noticed many women like herself who worked outside the home and felt guilty because their jobs threatened their husbands ' roles as providers or took time away from their children. Thus Friedan began to wonder not only about herself as a woman, a wife, and a mother, but also about the role society had shaped women to play.

In the Article “ The Problem That Has No Name” from her book The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedman stated: “ the problem that has no name stirring in the minds of so many American women today is not a matter of loss of feminity or too much education, or the demands of domesticity…. We can no longer ignore that voice within women that says: “I want something more than my husband and my children and my home….” Pg. 597

In Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan writes about women 's inequality from men to women 's equality to men, while also writing about women accepting the inequality to women and then fighting for equality. Friedan encourages women to find worth outside of the home and explore her possibilities but, “for the sake of every member of the family, the family needs a head. This means Father, not Mother. Children of both sexes need to learn, recognize and respect the abilities and functions of each sex. He is not just a substitute mother, even though he 's ready and willing to do his share of bathing, feeding, comforting, playing. [...] If in that world he is interested, courageous, tolerant, constructive, he will pass on these values to his children” (Friedan 99). Friedan is attempts to tell her readers that no matter the circumstances, men are “handed” power when they’re assigned their gender and they dominate the world in every aspect- jobs, politics and at home. Since the beginning, women, believing they didn 't have any other choice, would blindly follow their husband, because they were brought up believing when a woman grows up, they are to only marry and have children. “Girls didn 't get excited about things like that anymore. We don 't want careers. Our parents expect us to go to college. Everybody goes. You 're a social outcast at home if you don 't. But a girl who got serious about anything she studied, like wanting to go on and do research would be peculiar, unfeminine.

Friedan states that if a woman had a problem, she knew something was wrong with either herself or her marriage. Since no one else discussed their dissatisfaction with their wifely duties, the women who felt this believed they were the only one in this situation and something must be wrong with them. Friedan calls this “the problem that has no name” because there was a mass number of women feeling this way, but no one could put a name to this condition. Women who had this problem described it as feeling empty and incomplete, as if they didn’t exist. Although many women were feeling this way, the media still portrayed women as happy housewives, further reinforcing that no other women were feeling that way. Friedan goes on to say that we can no longer ignore this issue and lists the reasons people had to explain this phenomenon, such as the loss of femininity, too much education, or the demands of domesticity. She refutes these points, and at the end, Friedan says there is more behind “the problem that has no name” and, again, we can no longer ignore it.

A fear of social stigma was one factor that kept women from supporting each other. In "The Feminine Mystique", Betty Friedan discusses how American housewives went about

Betty Friedan struck an emotional chord that wavered long-standing beliefs regarding the traditional American housewife when she released her book, The Feminine Mystique. The work was historic for two very important reasons. One was that it was written by someone experiencing the aura of the “feminine mystique” personally, who could relate to the plight of the middle-class stay-at-home mother. Another is because while Friedan and others had witnessed the dissatisfaction of many American women individually through writing and speeches, the book also captured the voice of many of these women en masse with significant detail. Overall, the combination of personal experience and widespread testament provided Americans living in the nineteen-sixties

From her book The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan explores “the problem that has no name”. Women at this time were expected to find fulfilment in their roles as a wife, a mother, and a housekeeper. Wanting to do masculine things will, somehow, not only rob a woman of her femininity but also make her undesirable and immoral (Friedan, 1582). Friedan conducted a study focusing on women in the 1920s and 1930s who exercised their independence. She noticed how the women of the 1950s were far from such self-determination and instead facing an identity crisis and were feeling incapable and worthless (Friedan, 1584). There was deep dissatisfaction common to all housewives but it was talked about by no one for fear of being perceived as an undignified woman (Friedan, 1583). Ingrained in people’s minds was the “feminine mystique”, a mysterious, intangible quality that all women have (they were told); and once women entered their mystique, they would reach their fulfillment. This was the belief that women should want to achieve femininity as a wife, a

Thus, The Feminine Mystique was born. In fourteen chapters, Betty Friedan not only identified the cause of housewives’ unhappiness, but also explained why it occurred and how it could be stopped. She called upon not only women, but also men to end the stigmas that harmed women and directly wrote about how the liberation of women would benefit men as well. While the points Friedan discusses are broad concepts, she is able to relate to women on a personal level through the stories and anecdotes she collects and shares throughout her discussion of generalized topics. It is through these true stories and accounts that her book had such an emotional impact on women; they were able to see their own struggles in others and more easily realize just how much of an impact concepts such as gender roles had on American society.

“I belong to that classification of people known as wives. I am a wife...I, too, would like to have a wife.” In the 1960’s and 70’s women were expected to live a very simple life: raise kids, take care of the home, and serve your husband, but, as various causes for social change arose like movements for the protection of the environment, gay rights, and civil rights, so did the the feminist movement and its opposition to those same expectations. in the United States. Women like Betty Friedan started writing books like The Feminine Mystique and women who felt unhappy and frustrated with their lifestyles wanted to do more. Educated women felt In an excerpt from Judy Brady’s 1971 essay I Want a Wife Brady uniquely explains the plight of women

According to Betty Friedan, in her book “The Feminine Mystique” (1960), she suggests that all women wanted were to be happy homemakers. This means that women have always been represented as being indecisive, superficial and only engaged in domestic roles in family and society. Interestingly but unfortunately enough, these ideologies have permeated different areas in our lives.

During the 1960’s American women were confined to their houses. They were limited in almost every aspect of their lives. Expectations included: marrying young, starting a family, and devoting themselves to housework and their children. Wives had no legal right to their husbands money or property; however a husband could control their wife’s. Treatment of women was discriminatory. Judy Brady, a feminist, spoke out about the issues women were facing through her writing. Brady was inspired to write her “Why I Want a Wife” article after attending a feminist consciousness-raising session. “Why I Want a Wife” was printed in Ms. Magazine in 1970. In “Why I Want a Wife” Brady argues her claim that women’s roles were being underappreciated and the idealistic

The sounds of clinking and clanking pots and pans dominates my house as the women fill the house with an enticing aroma of dinner, while the men in my house lounge on the sofas peering into the images that flash across the television screen. This episode of male tyranny is ubiquitous, and all families swear allegiance to the fact that males are the elite and women are the peasants. This is evident because wives are required to do all the housework in order to meet the standards their spouse has established for them. This aspect of a women’s life is further explored in the feministic essay, “Why I Want a Wife”, by Judy Brady. In particular, the author emphasizes and sheds light upon the truth that women, especially those that are married, have numerous responsibilities that they bear on their shoulders, which is unfair and unjustified.

Prior to the second wave of feminism, women were expected to be housewives; women were expected to take care of their children, cook meals, and clean the house. Starting in the 1960’s, however, women would opt to obtain jobs as well as keep their current responsibilities as a housewife. For some women, they would trade their family entirely for their careers. It is not a coincidence that divorce reached an ultimate high

“Honey, I’m home!” the husband announces to the home. Here come the kids running to greet dad at the door and his wife following close behind. As to be expected all the laundry has been washed, ironed, and put away neatly. The house is spotless like it was never touched by sticky fingers and dinner is already on the table. This was the stereotype of the 1970’s housewife. Judy Brady’s “I Want A Wife” judges the stereotypical gender roles of the 1970’s that wives are meant to take care of the needs of their husbands.

In “The Satisfaction of Housewifery and Motherhood/Paradise Lost (Domestic Division)” by Terry Martin Hekker, a housewife from South Nyack, New York, she discussed why she favored being a housewife and she gave the history of her family as housewives. She talked about the stereotypes behind being a housewife. She also elaborated on the idea of the role of housewife dying off. Her main ideas of each article, which were written thirty years apart, have very different opinions on the occupation of being a housewife.