Research Paper On Betty Friedan

She was a well known American author and activist who believed in the movement for female empowerment. She was a feminist and believed in women equality in the workforce. On top of that, she was a loving mother to her children and a wife. All these traits describe Betty Friedan. Betty Friedan is one of the few voices , starting around the 60’s, who stood up for women’s rights. In the article , “Betty Friedan” by Mario Kaplan from the Jewish Women’s Archive website,it states, “[c]onsidered by many as the “mother” of the second wave of modern feminism, activist and writer Betty Friedan was one of the most influential feminist leaders of the 20th century”.

In 1962, only men can be head company owners, constriction workers, and business personnel. Thus, women were pushed to the side to be either secretaries or housewives. Betty Friedan, the first president for the National Organization for Women, was one of the most astonishing women in the sixties. Betty has been a great inspiration for my society and me.

Betty Friedan was a middle class, suburban housewife that realized she wanted more from life than being a housewife. However, she was not always a housewife; she was a highly educated woman who went to a prestigious all women college called Smith College. She earned a fellowship to study at the University of California, but she decided to be a reporter in New York City instead. Once she had her second child, she lost her job, and soon became bored with her domestic life and became affected by what she calls “The problem without a name”. So, she used her reporting skills to contact other woman who went to Smith College. She gave them a survey and that is where the research of her book came from. Her book is credited with causing the second wave

Betty Friedan was a significant role model to women everywhere in the early 1960s when she first came out with her book, The Feminist. Friedan’s book inspired women everywhere to work with government leaders in order to earn equal pay, and to avoid employment discrimination. Friedan’s actions directly lead to the creation of The National Organization for Women (NOW). This organization fought to ensure equality for women everywhere. They did not start out too successful in the early 1960s, but by the end of the second year, they rounded up just about 1,035 members. The group tried to make their own Bill of Rights for women; it made sure to enforce the laws of banning employment discrimination; maternity leave rights; child care centers; tax deductions for child care expenses; equal and unsegregated education; and equal job-training opportunities

In conclusion, Betty Friedan was really one of the most influential women of the 20th century, even if she isn’t as famous as she should be. She changed the everyday life of a women as they knew it. With campaigns, rallies, speeches, organizations, and her novel; she really impacted the life of the average American woman. For that, we thank

Unfortunately, women have been held at a disadvantage for much of human history. We have been seen as vapid and less worthy than our male counterparts. We have been denied jobs and education, being told that a woman “should stay home and take care of her husband and children”. Even today, we are paid less than men doing the same job as us. Today’s female experience is better than, say, that of a woman in the 1920’s.

Betty Friedan knew that women were in depression over the fact that women couldn’t be viewed as equal and being able to do the same thing as men. She wrote the book to produce an image to the American population of how women tried to integrate in contempt of their lack of fulfillment. In the Feminine Mystique, she states “Each suburban wife struggles with it alone. As she made the beds, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate peanut butter sandwiches with her children, chauffeured Cub Scouts and Brownies, lay beside her husband at night- she was afraid to ask even of herself the silent question-- 'Is this all?” (Friedan). She takes the time to notice that women across the country are living in a world where they are scared to step up and attempt to be more and above the norm of society. She wants women to realize they aren’t alone on the aspect of wanting to be more than just a house wife. Women need to start being creative in their own work and doing so will help them know herself as a

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

Betty Friedan supports abortion on demand. She believes that mother’s should have the liberty of choice. Mother’s ought to have the rights to creativity beyond being a mother. This creativity involves pursuing a career in different occupations and to reject the prejudices about being feminine. Friedan insists on a woman’s right to choose whether to have a child or not. She thinks that motherhood will be accepted joyfully and as a great experience in life, if the choice was freely chosen. The conflicts of being a mother will not exist once women are the masters of their own faith and the captain of their souls: “I am saying that motherhood will only be a joyous and responsible human act when women are free to make, with full conscious choice and full human responsibility, the decisions to

Betty Friedan wrote The Feminine Mystique, which explored the idea of women stepping out of their traditional roles and encouraged them to pursue their own happiness and satisfaction. Her book sparked thoughts in people by encouraging women to speak out their ambitions, allowing her to take a stand in

This text is considered revolutionary for the 60s when it polarized society. It is symbolic of the Women's rights movement and feminism. In contemporary texts, Friedan

Susan B Anthony once said, “Men, their rights, and nothing more; women, their rights, and nothing less." For decades now, our society has been dealing with gender inequality. Most men wouldn’t care about this issue because their lives aren’t being impacted by this. Women have been, and are still facing discrimination against their gender. The inequality negatively influences a woman’s life at home, school, and at work. It also limits the things that they are capable of doing and it violates their human rights. Compared to how it was back then, there has been a great amount of change in our society, but men are still preferred over women in most situations.

The search of identity is an issue familiar to contemporary society as well as to the society of 1963 when Betty Friedan published her feminist manifesto The Feminine Mystique. The main idea of Friedan's article The Feminine Mystique is the question of how individuals can realize their full capacities and achieve identity. She argues how human identity is meaningful purposeful work, and how individuals are not identified as women or men just human by their work. Friedan believes work is what an individual does in his or her life; for example, snowboarding, songwriting, hockey, football etc.. Friedan is an author, an activist, and the first president of the National Organization for Women. The National Organization for Women aimed to promote

Women in the United States have faced many inequalities between their families, employment, education, and politics. As a woman myself, I have seen the changes in how women are treated in today’s time, but there are some things that still have to be changed. A good amount of men have said before that women should be treated unequally due to their feminine aspects about themselves. Women are believed to be unqualified to take upon the position of a man in the workplace, there has to be a change in how the word gender is represented in the workplace. Women are the ones who bare children and create a better future for them when they are born, why have them treated differently for being who they are as a person and show it to the world how different they are. They have faced these inequalities with the men for many years and have challenged each action with a victory for themselves. Earning a lower pay has made women fight for their right for equal pay. It took a great effort for women to be able to attend classes as men also went to school. Women have been faced with the battles of equality with men for many years. .

As a woman living in the early to mid-1900s, Betty’s experiences in her childhood along with her home life affected how she viewed the society around her and had an influence on her activism. As a child, she constantly noticed her mom cleaning, cooking and nothing more which, made her wonder if her mom could or would pursue anything else. In an Interview, Betty Friedan stated, “My mother had been the women's page editor of the Peoria newspaper and she loved it. But in that era, married women didn't work. After she got married, that was the end of [her] career. Assuming that she had a lot of my energy and ability, there wasn't [a] use for it. I mean, she ran the Sunday school one year, and the women's division of the community chest one year, and took up that era's version of