Thoughts on the Feminine Mystique

Okay so this isn't art related, but I thought I would talk about it.  Years ago I tried to read the Feminine Mystique it was going good until I hit the section on the 1950's.  It seemed like the author was presenting a stereotype to me; it didn't fit with either one of my grandmothers.  The FM presented women of the 50's as bored housewives who ate nutritionally fortified chalk to keep their hourglass figures.                      Well to begin with my grandma on Dad's side had a bit of a very human wild streak and bad luck with men.  For awhile anyway she was a single mother and a far cry from the bored stay at home woman.  She had a teaching certificate, so she did teach for awhile.  She also worked for awhile as an accountant, which is how she came to own and run a chicken-egg farm.  She had been keeping books for the original owner who decided to get out of it and gave her the business.  After she died I guess the city of Janesville dedicated a tree or bench to her in one of the parks.  As an older woman I can think of one example where she tried to help a woman out of a domestic abuse situation.                                                                  My grandma on my Mom's side is very much a fighter.  To her Dad's credit he did not tell her "Good girls don't fight!"  Instead he laid down some ground rules.  If she was fighting in defense of herself, or family, or someone who needed help that was fine.  If she was bullying or starting fights then she would get in trouble.  His other rule was that if she was going to fight she had to win.  Unfortunately he was gored to death by a bull he was helping another farmer transport.  Things went to pieces.  Fast forward a bit she ended up getting pregnant before she finished high school, but she refused to allow them to remove her from school.  She was determined to get her degree.  I believe protocols then and to some extent still are to get the pregnant girls out of sight.  She did get her degree and she was also valedictorian.  She did marry grandpa, but she was still a working woman.  She ended up going back to school to be a machinist.  She got to work on the engines of the Navy's wolf class submarines.                                                    So neither one fits the FM idea of 50's women.  Kind of a side thought is that I have always felt fortunate to be alive at the time I am for lots of reasons.  One reason in particular though sex ed was part of my education.  I can't help but wonder how things would have been different for my grandmas if safe sex would have been taught then.  This is something the religious right likes to go after, but lets be honest it is a myth that this stuff did not happen in the past.  Abstinence classes are bullshit, and organizations like Planned Parenthood are important services, and no they do not just do abortions.