More from Betty Friedan
I can’t point to any major episodes of sexual discrimination in my early life. But I was so aware of the crime, the shame that there was no use of my mother’s ability and energy.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan The feminist revolution had to be fought because women quite simply were stopped at a state of evolution far short of their human capacity.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan The feminine mystique has succeeded in burying millions of American women alive.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan Women, because they are not generally the principal breadwinners, can be perhaps most useful as the trail blazers, working along the bypaths, doing the unusual job that men cannot afford to gamble on.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan A woman is handicapped by her sex, and handicaps society, either by slavishly copying the pattern of man’s advance in the professions, or by refusing to compete with man at all.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan I won a really big fellowship to go straight on to get my Ph.D. And I went through agonies of indecision, and then I decided not to accept it. I just decided I didn’t want to be an academic.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan Neither woman nor man lives by work, or love, alone … The human self defines itself and grows through love and work: All psychology before and after Freud boils down to that.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan I never set out to write a book to change women’s lives, to change history. It’s like, ‘Who, me?’ Yes, me. I did it. And I’m not that different from other women. Maybe my power and glory was that I could speak my truth as a woman and it was the truth of every woman.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan I knew one thing. I did not want to be a mommy like mommy.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan The problem that has no name-which is simply the fact that American women are kept from growing to their full human capacities-is taking a far greater toll on the physical and mental health of our country than any known disease.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan To protest free speech in the name of protecting women is dangerous and wrong.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan When she stopped conforming to the conventional picture of femininity she finally began to enjoy being a woman.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan Dominance is a burden. Most men who are honest will admit that.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan I understood somehow my mother’s frustration. And that it was no good not only for her, but for her children or her husband, that she didn’t have a real use of her ability.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan Each woman is made to feel it is her own cross to bear if she can’t be the perfect clone of the male superman and the perfect clone of the feminine mystique.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan Men are not the enemy, but the fellow victims. The real enemy is women’s denigration of themselves.
Betty FriedanBetty Friedan
Original quotes
From our community writers
In this wilderness, Mankind is the animal I fear.
Addison SchmittAddison Schmitt The irony is that he broke the only person he never wanted to hurt.
Krishan PandeyKrishan Pandey I will wait, I am waiting, and I will love you with all the love I posses until this body is ash and I begin my search for you again.
Tyler Knott GregsonTyler Knott Gregson Nothing is permanent not even your pain.
Taj AroraTaj Arora Do not insist me to let you go, you come half hearted like a crescent moon, and you go heart-filled like a full moon which glows.
Nikita GandhiNikita Gandhi I want to fold you into my book, like a petal, so that you’d never leave.
Mira R. AridiMira R. Aridi It seems strange how we look in the same mirror, yet what stares back, is so painfully different.
Chris AllchinChris Allchin Do not measure yourself by success, failure, or a degree. Measure your life by the dreams you have.
Natalie MooneyNatalie Mooney
Meet the writers
More on children
In the black culture, certain kids are given nicknames that they roll with forever; the nicknames outweigh their real names. I’m one of those scenarios.
Snoop DoggSnoop Dogg Live so that when your children think of fairness, caring, and integrity, they think of you.
H. Jackson Brown Jr.H. Jackson Brown Jr. Always kiss your children goodnight, even if they’re already asleep.
H. Jackson Brown Jr.H. Jackson Brown Jr. I love playing for my country, getting the support. Especially for the kids and everybody, showing my example of what I can achieve so early. And maybe they can achieve it, too, just to get that in their minds.
Maria SharapovaMaria Sharapova When I got the red card all the Chelsea players come around. It felt like I had a lot of babies around me.
Zlatan IbrahimovićZlatan Ibrahimović People expect star kids to be perfect – horse-riding, fighting.
Fahadh FaasilFahadh Faasil I believe when your children are born that you are reborn in some fashion.
Bruce SpringsteenBruce Springsteen The soul grows by reincarnation in bodies provided by nature, more complex, more powerful, as the soul unfolds greater and greater faculties. And so the soul climbs upward into the light eternal. And there is no fear for any child of man, for inevitably he climbs towards God.
Annie BesantAnnie Besant