Book 1 Post 2
Gloria Steinem’s “My Life on the Road” is a culmination of stories dealing with many different topics about Steinem’s travels throughout her life. As a child, Steinem’s father emphasized the importance of traveling, and every fall after school was out, they would always go on a new trip. Traveling continued to be a major part of Steinem’s life even into adulthood. Traveling is viewed as essential to the Steinem family because it teaches experiential lessons, and one learns a lot about other people and gains unique perspectives. As mentioned in an interview about the book I saw on YouTube, Gloria Steinem views all humans as special and unique, and we all have something we can learn from each other. What makes each human unique is our hereditary and environmental makeup which means the more we meet new people, the more we understand life overall.
There are two stories from the book that I would like to
share. The first is about the sexism that was rooted in the airline industry in
the 1970s and is still present today. Since Steinem traveled frequently, she always
found herself on airplanes. Steinem liked to observe the stewardesses on the
flights. The stewardesses were treated as sexual objects and “decorations” on the
flights. Stewardesses had to be young, beautiful, and single women. Once they
got into their 30’s or got married, they were immediately fired from their job.
Additionally, many of the stewardesses were expected to give sexual favors to
the pilots. All throughout the media, airlines ran campaigns that sexualized stewardesses.
There were movies such as “The Swinging Stewardesses,” and ads with phrases
like, “She’ll Serve You – All The Way.” Also, the female stewardesses received
way worse working conditions than the men. Female flight attendants received 4
times less pay than the men and they had to share rooms while men got a private
room on layovers. In addition, the women often got in trouble for “talking back”
to men on the plane who frankly deserved to be “talked back” to. In the
chapter, Steinem discusses a theory that people who are oppressed often oppress
others who are also in an oppressed group. Steinem gives the anecdote of how
she and her speaking partner Dorothy Hughes were once on a flight together to
give a speech in Kansas. While Hughes was nursing her baby, a female flight attendant
looked down upon this “natural” and “feminine” act and rudely told her that she
must nurse her baby in the restroom. It is flat out disturbing that sexism reached
such a low point, that women were putting down other women and not protecting women’s
rights. Overall, just by going on a plane, it is amazing how much Steinem was
able to analyze human behavior and how she could use these instances as motivation
to continue fighting for women’s rights.
The last story I will discuss is the story of Harriett
Woods. The story of Woods’ political career is such an incredible underdog
story. She started off as just a mother who was frustrated about a manhole
cover that made an annoyingly loud sound and would wake her family up. She started
a petition that got passed, and then from there she ended up running for city
council and winning. Then she joined the state highway commission and after 8
years was then elected to the state legislature. Her latest mission was to run for
the U.S. Senate. First, she beat out a rich banker for the Democratic Party
nominee. Then it was between her and John Danforth, the Republican nominee who comes
from a family of wealth and Catholicism. The race was very tight, and many
thought she would pull out the victory, but ultimately, she ran out of funds
and lost by an extremely tiny margin. Woods had such a strong fanbase and was seen
as a feminist icon and after she lost, EMILY’s List was started to help fund future
women candidates in the Democratic party who were for abortion rights. This ended
up becoming a huge resource for future women candidates. Steinem says that her
loss ended up having a profound loss that changed the world for the better. The
point that is being made here is that voting is not everything when it comes to
activism. A vote only means so much, and it is up to young, inspired activists
to go out and physically make the change that they want to see. When a vote is
lost, that does not mean the fight is over and activists need to keep pushing
for change no matter what. Also, the story of Harriett Woods is proof that any young
woman out there from any background can have a successful political career if
she can effectively successfully voice the concerns of the people and make
positive change for women just like Woods.
Very interesting and thorough book post, Jake, I really enjoy reading it. It is a really sad fact that, sexism, along with other types of -ism's, still present in the airline industry today. My supervisor told me how she was judged a certain way for being a blonde, white girl in her 20s; although she worked really hard to advance to the position she's in today, her co-workers and subordinates avoid to seek help and ask questions from her because they assume she's inexperienced based on how she looks.
ReplyDeleteHi Jake! I've also been reading Gloria Steinem's book and there really are so many alarming truths that can be found through her stories that I might have never known about otherwise. Although I've seen many references to stewardesses being sexualized in popular media, I never knew how bad it actually was back then. Although I'm glad we've come so far as a society with regard to social justice and equality, it's unfortunate that we started at such a low place.
ReplyDeleteHi Jake, this is Annie. I enjoyed reading the post especially the stewardesses part. To my observation, I notice that comparing to China, U.S airline industry is more inclusive that welcome stewardesses from all ages, regardless of their appearance.
ReplyDeleteI also read this book and I find it really thought provoking to see what takeaways the men who have read this book in the class have vs. the women. I think there are a lot of other areas in the service industry where women are sexualized in similar ways to flight attendants-- I mean have you ever been to Hooters? Although men don't work at Hooters so that argument probably doesn't have a lot of merit since you can't compare their treatment. I enjoyed reading what you got out of Steinem's reading and the additional interpretation; I agree that Steinem is impressively observant.
ReplyDeleteHi Jake, great post. I was amazed by the story of Harriett Woods that you included in your last paragraph. I am surprised I have never heard of her story, especially as I’ve learned more and more about this subject over the course of college, but nonetheless I am glad I know more now. I also think I will have to read Steinem’s book! I liked the format of America Ferrara’s American Like Me, and it sounds like the two books have similar formats. Thanks for using such great depth and detail in your post.
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