Each Woman Is Made To Feel It

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."

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.

When She Stopped Conforming To The Conventional Picture Of Femininity She Finally Began To Enjoy Being A Woman.

Over And Over Again, Stories In Women's Magazines Insist That Women Can Know Fulfillment Only At The Moment Of Giving Birth To A Child. They Deny The Years When She Can No Longer Look Forward To Giving Birth, Even If She Repeats The Act Over And Over Again. In The Feminine Mystique, There Is No Other Way For A Woman To Dream Of Creation Or Of The Future. There Is No Other Way She Can Even Dream About Herself, Except As Her Children's Mother, Her Husband's Wife.

The Media And Even, To Some Degree, Leaders Of Women's Organizations Don't Understand That The Women's Movement Is An Absolute Part Of Society Now. It Is In The Consciousness, It Is Taken For Granted. It Is Part Of The Way Women Look At Themselves, And Women Are Looked At.