Book Review

by Sheila (30-B-2) FPE

THE FEMININE MYSTIQUE, by Betty Friedan. Dell Pub- lishing, New York, 1964, #2498, paperback, 75¢.

The "Mystique" of the title refers to an image to which one tries to conform, and the subject of this con- troversial best-seller is the false image to which modern American women are sacrificing their legacy of freedom, hard-won by the "suffragettes" of a few generations ago. The falsity of this image, the author indicates, is being deliberately shaped by those who stand to profit emot- ionally, financially, or both by the continuation of the second-class status of women. Regardless of the de- liberateness, there is no doubt of the reality of the pres- sure on women to conform to the "Happy Housewife" standard by turning off their minds and being good, tract- able, smiling consumers of over-priced goods.

She makes some distinction between the old Judeo- Christian down-rating of women and the new mystique, though granting that the latter owes much to history. Freud's misunderstanding of the woman, which disrupted his own household, is pinpointed as a source; the unwise support lent his theories by Margaret Mead is another. Dr. Mead's personal life is contrasted to her printed words as an example of the conflicts created by this false image. Mrs. Frieden's analysis of women's maga- zines, based on first-hand inside experience, is devas- tating. Commercial exploitation of the mystique, a re- latively recent development, is also well handled.

Obviously, the responsibility for this "conspiracy" is placed squarely on the men; women are blamed chiefly for their spineless acceptance of the situation. BUT, BUT, the author seems blind, or nearly so, to the harm done to men by this and the corresponding masculine mystique. Both are old; in 1881, R. L. Stevenson wrote "But it is the object of a liberal education not only to obscure the knowledge of one sex by another but to magnify the na- tural differences between the two.. the little rift is astonishingly widened by simply teaching one set of

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