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Aging is not “lost youth” but a new stage of opportunity and strength.

Betty Friedan

When I was in high school, even in college, I didn’t have any real image of a career woman or a professional woman.
BETTY FRIEDAN

College Image Myself Professional School
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 FRIEDAN

Competition Handicapped Man Pattern Profession Sex Slave Society Women
By now, abortion should be obsolete. And I – and probably a lot of other feminists – wish it were obsolete, because abortion, in itself, is not a value – it is simply the right to chose, which is an essential value.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Abortion Choice Essential Myself Necessary Women
Men weren’t really the enemy – they were fellow victims suffering from an outmoded masculine mystique that made them feel unnecessarily inadequate when there were no bears to kill.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Enemy Fellow Male Men Mystic Suffering Victim
We need to see men and women as equal partners, but its hard to think of movies that do that. When I talk to people, they think of movies of forty-five years ago! Hepburn and Tracy!
BETTY FRIEDAN

Equality Hard Men Movie Need Partner Thinking Women
When one begins to think about it, America depends rather heavily on women’s passive dependence, their femininity. Femininity, if one still wants to call it that, makes American women a target and a victim of the sexual sell.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Beginning Call Dependent Feminism heavy Passive Sexuality Target Thinking Victim Women
It is easier to live through someone else than to become complete yourself.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Choice Complete Easy Live Yourself
You can have it all, just not all at the same time.
BETTY FRIEDAN

One Liner Patience Time Yourself
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 FRIEDAN

Alone Definition Growth Human Live Love Man Women Work
The feminine mystique has succeeded in burying millions of American women alive.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Alive Burying Feminism History Lost Youth Millions Mystique Succeeded Women
life lived only for oneself does not truly satisfy men or women. There is a hunger in Americans today for larger purposes beyond the self. That is the reason for the religious revival and the new resonance of ‘family.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Beyond Life Live Men Purpose Satisfaction True Women
If women’s role in life is limited solely to housewife/mother, it clearly ends when she can no longer bear more children and the children she has borne leave home.
BETTY FRIEDAN

End Home Leaving Limitation Mom Responsibility Role Wife
He’s a male chauvinistic piglet.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Insult Male
I have discovered that there is a crucial difference between society’s image of old people and ‘us’ as we know and feel ourselves to be.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Age Crucial Differences Discover Feel Image Know Ourselves People Society
If I were a man, I would strenuously object to the assumption that women have any moral or spiritual superiority as a class.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Class Man Moral Myself Object Spiritual Women
Today the problem that has no name is how to juggle work, love, home and children.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Children Home Love Name Problem Work
Protectiveness has often muffled the sound of doors closing against women.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Close Protection Sound Women
A woman has got to be able to say, and not feel guilty, ‘Who am I, and what do I want out of life?’ She mustn’t feel selfish and neurotic if she wants goals of her own, outside of husband and children.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Children Dreams Freedom Goals Guilty Herself Husband Reality Talk Woman
Dominance is a burden. Most men who are honest will admit that.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Admit Burden Dominance Honesty Men
Who knows what women can be when they are finally free to become themselves?
BETTY FRIEDAN

Freedom Inspirational Women Women Empowerment
Some people think I’m saying, ‘Women of the world unite — you have nothing to lose but your men. It’s not true. You have nothing to lose but your vacuum cleaners.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Lose Men People Thinking Unity Women World
Regardless of your age, you will always have adventures, unexpected joys and unexpected sorrows.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Adventure Age Expectation Inspirational Joy Regard Sorrow Yourself
There is absolutely no evidence that it is harmful to children if their mother’s health, well-being and autonomy and control of her own destiny is maximized by work outside the home.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Children Control Evidence Harm Health Home Mother
Who knows what women can be when they are finally free to become themselves? Who knows what women’s intelligence will contribute when it can be nourished without denying love?
BETTY FRIEDAN

Contribute Freedom Intelligence Love Nourish Women
If you were very bright and you became head of a department, as I did, of the psychology department, you were encouraged to go on to graduate work. But as a women you didn’t even think about discrimination.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Bright Department Discrimination Education Encouragement Graduation Head Smart Thinking Yourself
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 FRIEDAN

Cross Feeling Feminine Herself Women
Just as darkness is sometimes defined as the absence of light, so age is defined as the absence of youth.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Absence Age Darkness Deep Defined Light Youth

Aging is not “lost youth” but a new stage of opportunity and strength.

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Aging is not “lost youth” but a new stage of opportunity and strength.

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