Me (to cubemate): So, not to be divisive or anything, but how come the flags were at half mast for Rosa Parks but not for Betty Friedan?
Her: Don't know. Who makes that decision, anyway?
Me: It's the President .... Oh. Guess I answered my own question.
Explanation: I don't begrudge a whit of the honors given to Rosa Parks or to Coretta Scott King; I was glad to see them. It's easy to make an argument that Coretta's case is different, that she was honored for a whole lifetime of leading the fight against prejudice, war and poverty. Rosa Parks fought prejudice her whole life too, but the thing for which she is most honored is for being the living spark that set off the latest and hottest fire in that fight. In that respect, I think the analogy to Betty Friedan is accurate. I hesitated before posting this, because as both women's predecessors like the Grimkes and Sojourner Truth knew, the two battles are not separate but are part of a larger war against injustice in general.
Still, I think the lack of honors given to Friedan are an accurate barometer of the current level of social acceptance of feminism. I'm happy with how far we've come (far enough that when I read The Feminine Mystique I was shocked by the attitudes Friedan described) but it's as if we're supposed to believe that we got here without a fight, presumably because male society spontaneously decided that the previous state of affairs was wrong and women deserved something closer to equal opportunities and equal pay.
It's important to ackowledge and study the fight to get where we are. If all this was a gift, it can as easily be taken away.
I'm not sure why we honor the fight for equality of the races but not of the sexes. Both have captured a lot of ground, but neither fight has yet been won. In both cases, there are plenty of people who declare that the battle is over and equality reached when that isn't the experience of the people concerned, in an effort to prevent more ground from being won. My instinct says that the more the fights for equality among races, genders, and sexual preference are separated, the worse for those fighting - I wouldn't say there's anyone actually strategizing against either, but divide and conquer is an effective strategy nonetheless.
Posted by dichroic at February 6, 2006 08:48 AMIt always seems to be someone -- a white man, usually -- who is making a decision on what is best for society. (At least it is best for him.) Forcing women to either stay at home or feel guilty for working was never a very good idea. I was a lot more feminist than that, though I'd never burn my bra. (That was for girls without boobs.) But I read *The Feminine Mystique* just after I met my husband. When Friedan said "there's more to life than husband and babies," my reaction was "but what's wrong with that?" Then again, before our tenth anniversary I had re-entered the work force.
Posted by: l'empress at February 6, 2006 02:24 PM