The Feminine Mystique - Betty Friedan - Part 7

The Feminine Mystique - Betty Friedan

2017 Reading Challenge - Day 101

  April 12, 2017 

Book 31 - The Feminine Mystique
Betty Friedan (1997)
 Part 7 - pages 206-232
Reading Time - 1 hour

So, we all know that the chief business of America is business. The almighty Dollar is king in the U.S. And, as it turns out, women (at least in the 1960s) are the chief consumers of American business. Friedan interviewed some advertising/marketing consultant who had this to say about women and shopping:

"Properly manipulated, American housewives can be given the sense of identity, purpose, creativity, the self-realization, even the sexual joy they lack, by buying things".

Let's get the housewives to enjoy housework and have fun with it!! Let them be creative with their ready-made cake mix! Let them use as many different products to clean their house (rather than just vinegar and baking soda) so that they feel less like an unskilled labourer (which is what they are) and more like an engineer or expert!!! Oooohhhh...  Let's create the illusion of some sense of "achievement"! Let's get them all to buy Sterling Silver (which is horrible to keep untarnished) because they need to keep up with appearances. "What... you only have stainless steel cutlery... you must be so poor." Let's make the housewife feel a sense of achievement for cleaning her silver! Cause Sterling Silver and China symbolize her success as a Modern Woman.

Well... this answers my question as to why everyone had to have China and Sterling Silver in their cupboards... stuff that they only used once a year (maybe twice) but had to keep clean. Crazy... it was like a make-work project.

Cause... it's all connected with the kind of person a woman is. Gotta sell the housewives things to satisfy their needs. Good grief... it sounds a bit like modern society actually. Where people keep buying things... bigger houses, bigger cars, more toys, more electronics, more more more... to satisfy that need... that identity, that purpose (see Advertising guy's quote above). The things is.... things will NEVER fill that hole. But we keep buying them. My Dad is getting Home Support twice a day and I know Home Support workers do not make a lot of money. But I tell ya... they drive the snappiest, new vehicles you ever did see. The question isn't "how can they afford those cars"... the question is "how deep in debt are they"?

Friedan closed off this chapter by asking... is this buying frenzy a sign of a sick/immature society and people. I'd raise my hand and say... "yup, it is".