Backlash: The Undeclared War Against

¶ … Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women

Susan Faludi's 1990s feminist classic Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women chronicles the widespread cultural resistance that arose to the gains women had made during the feminist liberation movement of the 1970s. Chapter 4: "The 'Trends' of Antifeminism: The Media and the Backlash" is a critique and an analysis of the superficiality with which the media often covers feminist issues. Protests against Miss America gained more attention than how feminist seriously critiqued the ways that women were valued in society. Feminism becomes a 'trend,' and ever trend is soon superseded by the next trend like 'cocooning' or nesting, (75; 83).

Faludi's portrait of the media is not so much that it is misogynist, but rather the media loves to tell a 'story,' for example, that women are bemoaning the loss of their fertility or dropping out of the management track. Consider the statistic that 30% of the class of 1976 of Columbia Business School was unemployed or self-employed. This seems to support the trend of 'cocooning' were it not for the much less interesting comparative statistic that 21% of the men are also unemployed. Sadly, this type of media hype and use of inflammatory statistics is simply 'par for the course,' harkening back to Good Housekeeping bemoaning that 'bachelor girls' could not be happy and that 1980s spinsters had a better chance of getting hit by lightening than finding a mate (99). Even Ms. magazine was prey to this lemming-like media trend, a trend that was built upon faulty statistics and manufactured images, not reality about the way women were living their lives (112).

Faludi's Chapter 9 is about a far more deliberate but no less harmful campaign to tell 'big lies' through the media. It is entitled "The Politics of Resentment: The New Right's War on Women." The chapter chronicles the New Right ministers' sadly successful fight against the Equal Rights Amendment, and how many New Right conservatives spokeswomen 'martyred' themselves for the cause, leaving their homes and families to embark upon lucrative speaking and advocacy careers, telling American women they should stay home and let men take on the role of the sole breadwinner of the American family. Feminists were demonized, despite the New Right idolization of the clearly 'working' British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (240).

Chapter 10: "Mrs. Smith Leaves Washington: The Backlash in National Politics" is a sobering read of the ground lost by women in politics, noting the decline of female representatives, senators, and appointments to the Reagan White House. One right-wing neo-conservative crowed that women were discovering that they can't "have it all" even though it was hardly females who were willingly seeking less pay than their male counterparts, for the same work (265).

That phrase 'having it all' occurs and reoccurs throughout all three chapters. The idea seems somewhat laughable, in light of the recent reinterpretation of modern work life in America. Many people work from home with the possibility of telecommuting now a reality. The idea of having a 9-5 job and a family is no longer seen as an ideal for all men or all women. Both men and women make use of flexible schedules, pursue several different careers over a lifetime, and take a varied and long and winding road to success. The process, not the destination is what is important, and spending time with children is part of this process, and so is working, regardless of the parent's gender. And it is the women's movement both men and women have to thank for this new occupational flexibility.