Betty Friedan 2006 Deaths

Betty Friedan

feminist icon and writer whose 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique, challenged postwar assumptions that women found fulfillment with domesticity. Indeed, she said women were dissatisfied with an existence in which they “made the beds, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate peanut butter sandwiches with her children.” She cofounded the National Organization for Women in 1966 and served as its first president. In 1969, she also helped establish the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws, now known as NARAL Pro-Choice America. Friedan also confronted the patronizing treatment of the elderly in 1993's The Fountain of Age.