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Old 10-27-2012, 07:11 AM   #65
JustJo
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Default Jumping off from the Good Wife's Guide post

So, let me start by saying I have never taken a women's studies course and have zero academic background on this era....so thank you to Martina and to pinkgeek for bringing in some of that context. I appreciate it greatly.

Here's my gut reaction to that 1955 "be a stepford wife" guide....

I think men, in general, were scared. WWII saw women stepping out of their former roles in massive numbers. Women were working out of the home, and not just as teachers and nurses....we were welders and truck drivers and machinists and every other thing that had been previously perceived as "men only."

And we did it well.

Women provided immense labor towards keeping the war effort, and the nation, moving...and we did it by doing things that men (in general) thought we could not do. I imagine that scared the crap out of them, because suddenly we were showing (not just saying) that we could do everything that men could do, and that we were their equals.

I don't think it's too big of a jump to say that seeing women perform work that had been percieved as too hard, too dirty, too whatever for them, was no less frightening to men than seeing former slaves learn to read and write was to former slaveowners. The biggest backlash towards any group has always happened when they try to step out of "their place."

I think the 1950s was about backlash, and men (and many women, too) trying to stuff women back into the box they had jumped out of.

I absolutely adore images of women from this time.


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Last edited by JustJo; 10-27-2012 at 07:20 AM. Reason: another thought
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