This is a quote from Gloria Steinem from February of 1972. She was speaking on women’s oppression and how equality did not exist. She is specifically saying in this quote that women were treated as second class citizens whose only function is to have children. The society at this time had not yet accepted women’s equality and women were still thought to be incapable of self governance hence the need for male dominance. Steinem is try to explain just how short sighted that mentality is and how unfair it is. She simply wants “social cohesion”, as Howard Zinn’s book calls it, she wants women to have equal opportunity and treatment. In this era women were rising against injustice but much like the civil rights movement it would take time before women would be accepted and integrated. Steinem herself was a woman so she knew and saw the unjustified treatment of women. She is not, however, trying to forward some radical agenda like WITCH, but rather she is using common sense to show why women should have social equality. She is a woman in a man’s world and that is just not fair to her.
P.S. Though originally posted on December 7th it didn’t appear. This is a copied and pasted repost so excuse me if there are two of the same posts.