Liberated but bound

Books and Movies 2006: Writer Caitlin Flanagan on where feminism went wrong | Susan Olasky

Caitlin Flanagan's To Hell with All That: Loving and Loathing Our Inner Housewife (Little, Brown, 2006) is a perceptive look at contemporary womanhood that doesn't shy away from the emotionally fraught issues captured by the term "mommy wars." A staff writer on The New Yorker, she has often described middle- and upper-middle-class women who have options their mothers could only dream of. Yet despite the choices, many modern women are deeply anxious and unhappy. Why?

WORLD: The women you write about don't seem very happy. They're anxious about their decision to work or stay home. They're ambivalent about housekeeping. They aren't even having sex. What makes them so nervous?

FLANAGAN: I think the women's movement demonized some of the most valuable and worthwhile work in the world: making a home for the people who love you. It's true that modern women feel two powerful impulses coming into collision: the impulse to make a mark on the larger world, and the one to make a deep and lasting impression on the daily lives of their families. It would be uncharitable to dismiss this conflict as minor. But they have not been served well by the lingering contempt for men which has been an unfortunate byproduct of the women's movement.