Click! The Housewife's Moment of Truth (Spring 1972)
(not much has changed in these fifty plus years)
Read the entire article at the link. some of us here are old enough to remember!!
Click! The Housewife’s Moment of Truth (Spring 1972)
3/4/2021 by Jane O'Reilly
To pay tribute to five decades of reporting, rebelling and truth-telling, From the Vault includes some of our favorite feminist classics from the last 50 years of Ms. For more iconic, ground-breaking stories like this, pre-order 50 YEARS OF Ms.: THE BEST OF THE PATHFINDING MAGAZINE THAT IGNITED A REVOLUTION (Alfred A. Knopf)—a stunning collection of the most audacious, norm-breaking coverage Ms. has published.
From the December 20, 1971 issue:
From the Vault: "Click! The Housewife's Moment of Truth" (Spring 1972)
Last June, 40 people were lying on a floor in Aspen, Colorado, floating free and uneasy on the indoor/outdoor carpet, eyes closed, being led through the first phase of a “Workshop in Approaching Unisexuality.” It would turn out later that the aim of the exercise was not to solve the problem of who does what and to whom, but to reveal to the participants that adjectives—such as warm, violent, soft, timid, peaceful and aggressive—are not necessarily definitions for male or female. We closed our eyes and cleared our minds. Slowly we perceived a lake in the distance, and as we walked toward it, the surface became smooth as a mirror into which we could look and see our reflection. There was no reflection. Infinitely slowly, we began to evolve into the animal that most expressed our own ideas of ourselves—of our sensual selves. Minutes passed and we became aware of the other animals around us. At last we opened our eyes and those animals that felt like it did whatever seemed natural. Most of the women twittered or purred. Most of the men growled, or attempted to wag tails. I was a cat, black, with a lovely long tail, sitting under a red geranium in a sunny window. We formed groups in our part of the conference-room forest, and told each other what we had become.
. . . .
Those clicks are coming faster and faster. They were nearly audible last summer, which was a very angry summer for American women. Not redneck-angry from screaming because we are so frustrated and unfulfilled-angry, but clicking-things-into-place-angry, because we have suddenly and shockingly perceived the basic disorder in what has been believed to be the natural order of things.
From the Vault: "Click! The Housewife's Moment of Truth" (Spring 1972)Jane O’Reilly’s “Click!” was the first Ms. cover story.
. . .
Attitudes are expressed in semantic equations that simply turn out to be two languages; one for men and another for women. One morning a friend of mine told her husband she would like to hire a babysitter so she could get back to her painting. “Maybe when you start to make money from your pictures, then we could think about it,” said her husband. My friend didn’t stop to argue the inherent fallacy in his point—how could she make money if no one was willing to free her for work? She suggested that, instead of hiring someone, he could help with the housework a little more. “Well, I don’t know, honey,” he said, “I guess sharing the housework is all right if the wife is really contributing something, brings in a salary…” For a terrible minute, my friend thought she would kill her husband, right there at breakfast, in front of the children. For 10 years, she had been covering furniture, hanging wallpaper, making curtains and refinishing floors so that they could afford the mortgage on their apartment. She had planned the money-saving menus so they could afford the little dinners for prospective clients. She had crossed town to save money on clothes so the family could have a new hi-fi. All the little advances in station—the vacations, the theater tickets, the new car—had been made possible by her crafty, endless, worried manipulation of the household expenses. “I was under the impression,” she said, “that I was contributing something. Evidently my life’s blood is simply a non-deductible expense.”
. . . .
I know a writer whose husband never once read her work. She visited an analyst who declared her role conflict a character defect. Her husband told the analyst he wouldn’t mind his wife’s inadequacies so much if she did something. “But she does write,” said the doctor. “Oh. That,” said the husband bitterly, dismissing the work he would eventually feel reflected credit on him, but only after their divorce. No, the question of housework is not a trivial matter to be worked out the day before we go on to greater things. Men do not want equality at home. A strong woman is a threat, someone to be jealous of. Most of all, she is an inconvenience, and she can be replaced. They like things as they are. It’s pleasanter. I had never realized how seductive the role of master is until the other day. I was watering a plant, and the water began to run on the floor. I stood where I was and moaned about the puddle until the live-in babysitter dropped what she was doing and brought me the rag it would have been easier for me to get. She, at least, was not saying, “Don’t worry darling, let me take care of it.” But my excuse was … I have more important things to think about than housework.
https://msmagazine.com/2021/03/04/from-the-vault-click-the-housewifes-moment-of-truth-ms-magazine-spring-1972/
