AJC.com > Opinion > Woman to Woman > Archives > 2007 > October > 06
Saturday, October 6, 2007
Is feminism to blame for the ‘happiness gap’?
Andrea Cornell Sarvady, a left-leaning columnist, writes the commentary this week and Shaunti Feldhahn, a right-leaning columnist, responds.
Rebuttal
The reason women feel so pressured isn’t because the choices exist but because feminism told us we should seize them all! Feminism wasn’t just about equality for women, but about pushing the Superwoman addiction. But as all frazzled Superwomen know, that’s a recipe for nervous breakdown - or for years of regret down the road.
I was blessed with a college-graduate mom who chose to be a domestic engineer. But in the 1970’s she was ridiculed so much for her stay-at-home status that she dreaded talking about it, and hearing condescending women say, “That’s all you do?”
Yet I’m sure my mother is far more happy - not less - for her choice to wait on her nursing career until we were older, instead of trying to have it all, all at once.
Carrie Lukas, VP of the Independent Women’s Forum and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Women, Sex, and Feminism, shared in an interview how hurtful feminist messages can be to women’s happiness. For example, she found feminist literature tended to “Only focus on the negative problems of marriage, which contributes to the idea that marriage is disposable. But married women in general are much happier!”
One of feminism’s biggest and most devastating myths is that you can “have it all,” but as Lukas also pointed out, “Having choices doesn’t mean you don’t have to make a choice. There are going to be sacrifices no matter what choice you make.”
I agree it’s significant that the “Happiness Gap” study found increased dissatisfaction for women across the board - but for a very different reason. Most women have a deep desire for someone to share their life with, to have children and watch them grow. There’s nothing wrong with seizing our modern workplace opportunities. But if a woman pursues those opportunities at the expense of those personal desires, and then finds that she’s lonely, past child-bearing age, or has missed the key moments in her children’s lives, why wouldn’t she have regrets?
I believe women would be far happier if feminism had been content with just pressing for equality for women - and hadn’t made that last paragraph so politically incorrect.
Services »
Commentary
By Andrea Cornell Sarvady
Bad news this month for women, experts at trying to Be All Things to All People: You’re flunking Self-Esteem 101. Two separate research studies, by economists from Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania, reveal a troubling fact: Men are happier than they were 30 years ago, while women are less satisfied. Thus, the “Happiness Gap” is christened.
Hear that crunch in the forest? It’s right-wing pundits, gathering kindling to burn the women’s movement at the stake. After all, what else could be to blame for our discontent?
Yet if we can grab the matches away from the anti-feminist brigade - ironically, filled with women whose big careers and supportive mates are byproducts of the movement - we’ll understand the true complexities that face us.
It’s telling that the Pennsylvania study showed increased dissatisfaction across the board for women, regardless of marital or work status, age or income. Also revealing is data showing that kids get happier at equal rates - until young women approach adulthood.
Why? Though the study considers fallout from the woman’s movement as a possible factor, more theories point to the anxiety that comes from multi-tasking ourselves into the ground. Unlike men, we can’t seem to let go of putting everyone on our To Do list, even as that list grows longer than our commutes and carpool routes.
Yet men report having fewer unpleasant tasks each week, even as they’ve increased their domestic loads to accommodate working wives. So much for the old hue and cry that equality demanded female gains at the expense of men.
Feminism is also hardly to blame for the surge in plastic surgery and persistence of Martha Stewart Mania. It’s more that, in this fast-paced world, we view every new idea as a royal command - and we’re the queens, commanding ourselves to perfection.
Limiting our career options won’t increase happiness; lowering our stratospheric standards just might. After all, choice is what we fought for, but it never meant choose everything. So add up your accomplishments, cut yourself some slack, and learn to say “no,” Ladies. Your very happiness is at stake. Don’t send it up in flames.