Backlash: The Undeclared War against American Women | Introduction
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Susan Faludi’s bestselling book, Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women, is a methodically researched and documented work challenging conventional wisdom about the American women’s movement and women’s gains in achieving equality in the latter years of the twentieth century. Faludi begins the book by looking carefully at then-current myths about the status of women, including the press reports that single career women are more likely to be depressed than other women, that professional women are leaving their jobs in droves to stay at home, and that single working women over age thirty have a small chance of ever getting married. Not only are these myths not true, says Faludi, but they are evidence of a society-wide backlash against women and what they have achieved in recent years. She describes this backlash as a ‘‘kind of pop-culture version of the Big Lie’’ and declares that ‘‘it stands the truth boldly on its head and proclaims that the very steps that have elevated women’s positions have actually led to their downfall.’’
In her book, Faludi takes the press to task for failing to challenge the myths about women in the 1980s and especially for spreading, through ‘‘trend journalism,’’ stories about how unhappy women are, despite their having reaped the benefits of women’s liberation in the 1970s. Faludi challenges the prevailing wisdom that the women’s movement is to blame for women’s unhappiness; she believes their unhappiness actually stems from the fact that the struggle for equality is not yet finished.
Faludi uses data from a wide variety of sources, such as government and university studies, newspapers, census reports, scholarly journals, and personal interviews to explore women’s status in the 1980s. The personal interviews offer a look at the individuals who are behind the ‘‘backlash’’ and, according to Faludi, are hindering women’s progress.
http://www.enotes.com/backlash-undeclared/****************
http://www.motherjones.com/arts/qa/1999/09/faludi.htmlSusan Faludi: the Mother Jones Interview
Arts: The Pulitzer Prize-winner who identified the backlash against feminism turns her attention to the next oppressed class: men.
Interviewed By Sue Halpern
September/October 1999 Issue
When Susan Faludi published Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women in 1992, the moment seemed ripe for a feminist revival. Bill Clinton had been elected, essentially, by women; Anita Hill had outed Clarence Thomas and sparked a national discussion on sexual harassment and gender inequality in the workplace; and Washington had hosted the largest pro-choice rally ever assembled. Meanwhile, Faludi's book, which investigated the myths of women's improving economic and social lives, crested the best-seller lists for almost nine months. Faludi herself became something of a cultural icon -- a professional feminist, pictured on the cover of Time, next to that other cultural icon, Gloria Steinem. But Faludi has always been, above all, a journalist -- in 1991 she won a Pulitzer Prize for labor reporting for the Wall Street Journal -- who's unable to resist a good story when she sees one. In the early 1990s, the stories she saw had mainly to do with men's anger and confusion. She started hanging out at job clubs and Promise Keepers rallies and in Marine recruiting stations and locker rooms. She spent time with male porn stars and cadets at The Citadel. Faludi began to see patterns emerging from these stories. Her new book, Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man, will be published in October by William Morrow & Co.
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So men are upset about the same thing their feminist wives and girlfriends and daughters have been upset about -- that they are judged on how they look. And they're obsessed about it too?
Eating disorders are on the rise in young men, which says something. And the other day, when I was getting my hair cut, the woman who was doing it told me that she's noticed that men are hysterical about their hair these days. They tell her that they're worried that if they lose their hair they won't get a woman. Which, ironically, is just the same thing that women have always said -- that if they're not thin or sexy or pretty enough they won't find a man.
Given men's current preoccupation with their looks, does feminism have things to teach men?
The feminist diagnosis, especially from second-wave feminists like Betty Friedan in The Feminine Mystique, has remarkable relevance to the male dilemma. The truth is that what feminism is asking for is exactly what men want in their own lives, which is not to be judged according to superficial and ephemeral and impossible-to-attain objectives. Men don't want to live in a world run on retail values any more than women do. Like women, they want to be needed and useful participants in society. They want to have real utility and to be engaged in meaningful work.
Your feminism has always seemed to come from an analysis of political and economic factors in the culture at large. This seems very different from the feminism of younger women, who focus more on being able to express themselves and achieve individual fulfillment and pleasure.
Younger women were born into a world driven by consumer, ornamental, celebrity values. Even if they don't espouse those values, they're caught up in a world where they are being told that they have to do these star turns -- where they have to appear on the cover of a book with their shirt off, for instance. It's easy to attack women who do that. I didn't grow up with that. The difference between older and younger feminists is how we respond to consumer culture. If you're caught up in it, you're probably not thinking about changing it.
What about the recent idea that it's feminist to choose to embrace what has traditionally been called, and derided as, feminine?
Just because someone wears a push-up bra does not mean she's not a feminist. It doesn't mean she is a feminist, either. It's not about what you wear, or if you use makeup or not. I put on lipstick at times, and at other times I don't. I wear various undergarments. But people who focus on that are missing the whole point, which is what you do in the world. Still, I am reluctant to condemn women who engage in this new brand of feminism -- and it probably is a brand by now, with its own trademark -- because it's not their fault. They are trapped in a world where the whole mechanism for social change has gone by the boards.
Are you saying that there is no way to promote social change anymore?
No, I'm saying it's not obvious. These days, everything changes overnight. Nobody knows who is in charge. No one knows who to appeal to. So we need to start at square one and figure out what the forces are and respond to them. It's as if the new culture has eaten up the society like a virus. It's a Philip K. Dick futuristic vision: our lonely selves and our credit cards. Maybe this is how it felt at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. The 19th century Dickensian world seemed utterly devastating and insurmountable, but eventually social and political analyses did make a difference. Right now, there is no honest discussion going on.
Isn't that what journalists are paid for?
Absolutely. One major factor contributing to the failure to have this discussion about our consumer society is the media. So much of what we are concerned about in this culture -- like, for example, who has the biggest market share -- has been midwifed by the media. And with less and less commentary of any value to people. So much of the cynicism in journalism comes from journalists willfully avoiding what's going on. Everything is working out just fine for them, and they don't want to question anything because then they'd have to question themselves. As journalists, that's one place to start.
And you? Do you see yourself as a journalist, which is how you have described yourself, or an activist, which is how you were cast after Backlash?
I try to throw these ideas out there and pray that others are thinking about them too. My role is as a writer, because that's where I enter public life. For me, being a writer is the best way to be an activist.
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