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I realized that what I was saying was threatening, somehow, to the editors of women’s magazines. That it threatened the very world they were trying to paint, what I then called the “feminine mystique.”

Betty Friedan

We broke through the feminine mystique and women who were wives, mothers and housewives began to find themselves as people. That didn’t mean they stopped, or had to stop, being mothers, wives or even liking their homes.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Beginning Break Feminism Finding Home Mom Mystery People Stop Wife Women
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
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
I love newspapers. I’ve worked on newspapers, all my life. I’ve always loved it.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Love Myself Work
I just decided that I didn’t want to be in the academic world, because it was [really] too easy for me at the top. But also it wasn’t active enough for me.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Academic Active Decision Easy Education Enough Myself Top World
Men are not the enemy, but the fellow victims. The real enemy is women’s denigration of themselves.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Enemy Fellow Men Victim Women
We can no longer ignore that voice within women that says: ‘I want something more than my husband and my children and my home.’
BETTY FRIEDAN

Children Family Happiness Home Husband Ignorance Longer Silence Voice Woman
The only way for a woman, as for a man, to find herself, to know herself as a person, is by creative work of her own.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Creative Equality Find Herself Know Man Person Way Women
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 FRIEDAN

Book Change Different History Live Myself Orthodox Set Women Writing
Aging will create the music of the coming century.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Age Century Creation Music One Liner
The feminine mystique has succeeded in burying millions of American women alive.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Alive Burying Feminism History Lost Youth Millions Mystique Succeeded Women
Aging is not “lost youth” but a new stage of opportunity and strength.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Age Lost Opportunity Stage Strength Youth
I knew one thing. I did not want to be a mommy like mommy.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Desire Known Mom Myself Ordinary
Advice? I don’t offer advice. Not my business. Your life is what you make it.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Advice Business Empire Fortune Idea Life Offer Willing Power
Dominance is a burden. Most men who are honest will admit that.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Admit Burden Dominance Honesty Men
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
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
Protectiveness has often muffled the sound of doors closing against women.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Close Protection Sound Women
Regardless of your age, you will always have adventures, unexpected joys and unexpected sorrows.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Adventure Age Expectation Inspirational Joy Regard Sorrow 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 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 FRIEDAN

Fact Growth Mental Health Name Problem Simplicity Women
I’m my age and I feel glorious.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Age Feeling Glorious Myself
A girl should not expect special privileges because of her sex, but neither should she “adjust” to prejudice and discrimination.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Adjust Discrimination Expect Girl Life Privilege Sex
Today the problem that has no name is how to juggle work, love, home and children.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Children Home Love Name Problem Work
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
While I had been, I guess, quite brilliant, academically, in my college years, I also had been editor of the paper, and I loved that. And, that was a much more active thing. And I missed it when I was doing graduate work.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Academic Brilliant College Graduation Love Myself Newspaper Quite
The situation of women and men is not comparable to worker-boss or black and white.
BETTY FRIEDAN

Black Compare Men Situation White Women Work

I realized that what I was saying was threatening, somehow, to the editors of women’s magazines. That it threatened the very world they were trying to paint, what I then called the “feminine mystique.”

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Popular Authors

I realized that what I was saying was threatening, somehow, to the editors of women’s magazines. That it threatened the very world they were trying to paint, what I then called the “feminine mystique.”

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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