Women becoming more submissive? (tradition, choices, choice, evolution, mission)

[Faint]

There seems to be a trend in which women are becoming more submissive and seeking traditional values opposed to the continued pursuit of female equality. Do you agree? I'm not sure myself, but certain discussions I've had recently and things I've observed make me wonder if women are moving slightly away from their own liberation.

Now, the following are just a few personal observations (including young women I've talked to in person/dated and society observed in my neck of the woods as well as through the media), so this is by no means a comprehensive study. Anyway, here are some things I've noticed:

• Girls on college campuses whose hobbies include knitting, not to mention my cousin in junior high and her little girl-friends who do the same.
• Girls eager to cook for "the boys"; eager to demonstrate their baking skills.
• Several young married women who let their husbands make almost all the decisions, offering their own input only once in a while.
• My own dates who like me to take charge of everything, like plans, reservations, directions...and dominant behavior in other ways.
• The continued (perhaps enhanced) objectification of women which they accept for the most part...the high heels, the v-string panties, the shaving of specific patches of hair, make-up/hair style obsession (nothing new), radical (unnecessary) surgeries--all of which seems to say that their sole purpose here is to look pretty for us guys.
• Female college grads seeking a husband who will "take care of them" (preferably wealthy).

If this is true, why do you think it's happening? Have they become sick of the responsibilities that come with freedom? Are they tired of dating men who are not masculine enough (note the feminization of men by media persuasion...girly-man models and skinny, effeminate rock stars)? Is this just the newer generation's rebellion against their women's-lib parents?

Or do you think that nothing really changed (aside from laws)...that women have always been naturally submissive?

[Willamena]

Originally Posted by Faint

There seems to be a trend in which women are becoming more submissive and seeking traditional values opposed to the continued pursuit of female equality. Do you agree? I'm not sure myself, but certain discussions I've had recently and things I've observed make me wonder if women are moving slightly away from their own liberation.

Now, the following are just a few personal observations (including young women I've talked to in person/dated and society observed in my neck of the woods as well as through the media), so this is by no means a comprehensive study. Anyway, here are some things I've noticed:

• Girls on college campuses whose hobbies include knitting, not to mention my cousin in junior high and her little girl-friends who do the same.
• Girls eager to cook for "the boys"; eager to demonstrate their baking skills.
• Several young married women who let their husbands make almost all the decisions, offering their own input only once in a while.
• My own dates who like me to take charge of everything, like plans, reservations, directions...and dominant behavior in other ways.
• The continued (perhaps enhanced) objectification of women which they accept for the most part...the high heels, the v-string panties, the shaving of specific patches of hair, make-up/hair style obsession (nothing new), radical (unnecessary) surgeries--all of which seems to say that their sole purpose here is to look pretty for us guys.
• Female college grads seeking a husband who will "take care of them" (preferably wealthy).

Knitting is anti-liberated? Oh my Brad, I've been doing it wrong all these years!

Seriously, None of the indicators you mention actually point to submissiveness (except maybe "other ways", but I'm sure that's all in good fun), and the "traditonal values" hinted at are entirely arbitary, not really tradition at all (summoning to mind conformity to a 1950's U.S. marketing advertisement campaign to sell home appliances that presented a pseudo-ideal of women as home-bodies).

Women have never ceased, in all their years of "liberatedness", engaging in fun activities like hobbies and crafts, cooking, pleasing their partners, or dressing to look attractive. (Equality hopefully means that they've been getting as good as they give.)

I would think your lady-friends who let you do the date-arranging are demonstrating personal or locally cultural preferences, if not simple laziness. That, too, has nothing to with "female liberation".

I don't know what it's like in your "neck of the woods," but where I come from the "liberation" gained from the feminist movement was about pay equity and fairness of treatment on a government and business level. Women are still making gains in that area, and there's still a ways to go.

Originally Posted by Faint

Or do you think that nothing really changed (aside from laws)...that women have always been naturally submissive?

I still don't see how you get "submissive" out of knitting. (This I'd like to hear.)

[MaddLlama]

Originally Posted by Faint

There seems to be a trend in which women are becoming more submissive and seeking traditional values opposed to the continued pursuit of female equality. Do you agree? I'm not sure myself, but certain discussions I've had recently and things I've observed make me wonder if women are moving slightly away from their own liberation.

I don't think so. I just think that the face of this liberation has changed drastically.

Girls on college campuses whose hobbies include knitting, not to mention my cousin in junior high and her little girl-friends who do the same.

Actually, this resurgence in knitting especially among college aged girls is from the feminist movement. The knitting craze started and became popular among "young adults" mostly because of Deborah Stoller - her books and her magazine which are teaching young girls how to be "domestic" and still be a feminist. It's wonderful really. I think the resurgence in interest in handi-crafts isn't making women more submissive, but rather women are taking what used to be "women's work" and putting a new feminist face on it.
I knit, and I don't feel submissive.

Girls eager to cook for "the boys"; eager to demonstrate their baking skills.

Women are better at cooking than men, in general. Feminists aren't allowed to cook? Yeah there are some hardcore feminazi's out there who want women to stay out of the kitchen, but just because a woman likes to cook or bake cookies for her boyfriend doesn't mean she's going to grow up to be the doting 50's housewife.
Again, I enjoy cooking and baking, and I don't feel submissive.

As far as everything else, I agree with Willamena. It's all really rather aribitrary, and Ozzie and Harriet never actually existed. *shrug*

[Faint]

Originally Posted by Willamena

I still don't see how you get "submissive" out of knitting. (This I'd like to hear.)

It just struck me as a primative handi-craft in contrast to activities with more advanced technology or other hobbies that might be more on par with what males do. And anytime I think of knitting, I think of the typical, "oh me oh my" housewife of the old days knitting baby clothing. It's a personal perspective I suppose.

[Willamena]

Originally Posted by Faint

It just struck me as a primative handi-craft in contrast to activities with more advanced technology or other hobbies that might be more on par with what males do. And anytime I think of knitting, I think of the typical, "oh me oh my" housewife of the old days knitting baby clothing. It's a personal perspective I suppose.

Like... Lego?

lol

[Sunstone]

Originally Posted by Faint

The continued (perhaps enhanced) objectification of women which they accept for the most part...the high heels, the v-string panties, the shaving of specific patches of hair, make-up/hair style obsession (nothing new), radical (unnecessary) surgeries--all of which seems to say that their sole purpose here is to look pretty for us guys.

I'm not sure you can make a strong argument that "looking pretty for us guys" is a sign of submissiveness, Faint. It actually seems to me that it's very much an opposite sign, a sign that women are taking power over their reproductive choices. But why would I say that?

In the first place, it should be noted that every traditional society with a history of repressing women, represses their expresssion of beauty and sexuality. Wearing "floor to ceiling" utterly plain garb designed to hide the female body is just one example of that. Prohibitions against using make up, against "immodest" dress, and so forth are usually sold to women as ways of gaining them the respect of men, but in actuallity they are ways of limiting female reproductive choice. But why?

The reason repressing a woman's expression of beauty and sexuality limits her reproductive choice is because women typically adopt a mating strategy of attracting, via their beauty and behavior, as many men as possible, and then choosing from those they attract which one(s) to mate with. In a sense, this is a passive strategy. But not really. It's actually quite agressive, provided the women are free to make themselves look as sexually attractive as they want to look. And this strategy is as old as the hills. Evidence from the evolutionary sciences indicates that women have been doing it for as long as we've been a species.

In other words, if you are going to repress women so that they are subordinate to men, you must repress their ability to choose mates for themselves, and the classic way of doing that has been to limit or eliminate a woman's ability to attract men to her.

So, the trend you see of "women making themselves pretty for us guys" is not, in fact, a sign of submission to men, but a sign of taking power over their own reproductive choices. Put differently, the more men a woman can attract, the more choices she has, the more options she has, the pickier she can be, about whom to mate with.

[egroen]

It just struck me as a primative handi-craft in contrast to activities with more advanced technology or other hobbies that might be more on par with what males do.

As opposed to the uber-techno art of football and drinking beer?

-Erin