10 Things That American Women Could Not Do Before the 1970s

[ismnotwasm]

1. Keep her job if she was pregnant.

2. Report cases of sexual harassment in the workplace.

3. Be acknowledged in the Boston Marathon.

4. Get a credit card.

5. Refuse to have sex with her husband.

6. Compete as a boxer in the Olympics.

7. Get a divorce with some degree of ease.

8. Celebrate International Women’s Day.

9. Have a legal abortion in most states.

10. Read Ms. Magazine!


http://msmagazine.com/blog/2013/05/28/10-things-that-american-women-could-not-do-before-the-1970s/

[redqueen]

1. K&R!

It still makes me ill to think of how Catharine MacKinnon was so routinely trashed on this site. She was responsible for #2.

[msongs]

2. #1 is false. I had two teachers who had babies and they were back a few months after nt

[gollygee]

3. My mom was fired when she got pregnant in 1966

but then went right back to work after she had a baby in 1969. So there was a lot of progress during that time, but in the 60s it's true that a lot of women got fired when they got pregnant.

[Bay Boy]

27. That was a rather long pregnancy...

...just an observation.

[gollygee]

46. ROFL

One was an older sibling and one was me

[ismnotwasm]

4. She had no right NOT to be fired is the point

There was no legal protection.



"Until the Pregnancy Discrimination Act in 1978, women could be fired from their workplace for being pregnant."

[SunSeeker]

19. Amazing how much people strain to miss the point, huh?

Last edited Tue May 28, 2013, 08:26 PM - Edit history (1)

There's always an exception, but geez, a woman's lot pre-1970 was pretty awful. Not that it's a bowl of cherries now....

[ZRT2209]

44. and that happens so frequently on DU, like they have nothing better to do

it's annoying

[LanternWaste]

45. I don't think the poster is straining to miss the point...

I don't think the poster is straining to miss the point; I think the poster does it rather easily and without effort through years of practice to better validate their own misconceptions.

[sinkingfeeling]

5. I was fired from my 2nd. shift job in 1969 when I was 3 months along.

[BlueMTexpat]

11. In the early 70s, in my school district, you were required to quit before five months.

Of course, I know lots who "fudged" a bit on the five months' notice ... and didn't blame them a bit.

Once you quit, if you weren't already covered under your husband's policy, you had no insurance. And you certainly got no maternity leave pay.

There was also no guarantee that you would have a job the following year - any job - let alone the one you had left. So yes, as one who actually saw several colleagues/friends/relatives have to undergo this stupid - and dehumanizing, considering how natural and necessary birth is if we want the species to continue - process, it did indeed happen. It was the rule, not the exception.

It should never happened at all.

Thankfully, my own children were in school (1st & 2nd grade) in those years. Otherwise, I would never even have been hired because I had young children at home, even though I had a Master's degree - and lots of relevant experience - in my subject area.

[we can do it]

60. My mom had to quit when she was pregnant with me.

Not everyone is a teacher.

[KT2000]

6. some places in the South -

a married woman could only be a substitute teacher
a divorced woman could not teach
a widow was allowed to teach

per my mother and grandmother who lived it. They headed West to survive.

[BlueMTexpat]

13. Of course, that was also true of some places in the West as well ...

[Bay Boy]

28. I think what they did was head west...

...and lie on their resume. Can't blame them for that.

[noiretextatique]

7. i could not wear pants to school

until i was in the 7thor 8th grade. that was @ 1969 or so.

[lolly]

8. I remember that

Yes, right about 1969. But they couldn't be slacks and a blouse; they had to be part of a matching set, at least at my school.

That actually lasted about a month; everybody ended up in flowered bell-bottoms by the end of the school year.

[HockeyMom]

10. I wore Hot Pants and Mini skirts to work in 1968

Nice working for a Fashion House in NYC I suppose.

[EC]

25. We could wear pants under our skirts or dress

if we rode a bike to school or it was winter. We had to remove them when we got to school though. Pants were allowed the year after I graduated...1968.

[Bay Boy]

30. That must have been an attractive look

I do recall little girls in the 50s wearing leggings, kind of them same thing, but they were Kindergarten through 2nd graders.

[lolly]

50. Oh, yes--I'd forgotten about that!

And it was quite attractive--lace-collared dresses with puffed sleeves, and a pair of pants (double-knit?) underneath.

[Nay]

16. 1970, I think. I graduated HS in 1969 and never could wear pants to school. nt

[LittleGirl]

17. yep, me too

I was in the 5th grade in 69 and my 6th grade class was finally able to wear slacks. I had to go out and get some too because I had so few pairs.

[HockeyMom]

9. Depends where you lived I suppose.

NYC.

1. I got pregnant in 1978 and wasn't fired or forced to resign.
2. They had a sexual harassment policy.
3. Lived in NYC, not Boston.
4. I got a credit card on my own when I got a full time job in 1968.
5. Married in 1974. A ROFL on that one.
6. Didn't know any boxers, male or female.
7. My Aunt was divorced in 1954 after 6 months of marriage.
8. We burned our bras in the 70s.
9. Abortion was legal in NYS before Roe.
10. I read Ms. Magazine in 70s, and even as a married woman!

[ismnotwasm]

12. The boxer one didn't impress me either

The point of the article is protective legislation enacted during the 70's.

[HockeyMom]

26. Then go with Abortion

Abortion was legal in 13 states before Roe. I believe NYS legalized and wrote it into their state constitution in 1971.

[SunSeeker]

43. Yes, you pretty much couldn't get a legal abortion in NY pre-1970. The law barely passed.

The pro-choice forces got lucky and surprised the anti-abortion forces. Even then, the law passed by only a few votes. A squeaker to be sure. And once the Catholic Church realized what had happened, it mobilized its forces in NY. I think but for Roe v. Wade in 1973, NY's law would have been severely scaled back. Roe v. Wade was vital not only in states where abortion was illegal but in states where there were newly passed liberalizing laws, like NY.

http://www.nytimes.com/2000/04/09/nyregion/70-abortion-law-new-york-said-yes-stunning-the-nation.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

[nolabear]

20. BEFORE the 1970s. Those 60s created some changes!

[ismnotwasm]

21. Heh

Didn't they just though.

[LynnTTT]

29. A lot of changes

Between 1965 when I graduated high school and the mid70's.

A woman living in VA couldn't go to the University of Va, for which parents were paying taxes.
My small college in NC had curfews for women but not for men.
When I wanted a job, I looked in the Baltimore Sun under "help wanted-women". Those jobs were all secretarial or administrative assistants. Ménage meant trainees were lited under "men"
Couldn't get a credit card in your own name, only in husbands name.

And in the 90's, a friend was offered a very good job and accepted. The guy said, "don't you want to discuss it with your husband first?"

[bettyellen]

52. the OP says BEFORE the 70's!

So, yeah- you have a lot to be gratreful for, huh?

[SheilaT]

57. Notice, the OP is about things a woman could not do before the 1970's.

And I'm curious, what credit card did you get in 1968? The general bank cards (Visa, MasterCard, etc) didn't really exist then. I think the predecessor to the Visa, BankAmericard was around in a few places that early, but very few. Of course plenty of department stores had credit cards, and they weren't too difficult to get.

[ReRe]

14. It was really rough to have to wear skirts...

... on hay rides. I always came home with a rash all over my legs & scratched up. Much earlier, it was the norm that if a woman got married she couldn't be a teacher, (like up to the early 1900s.) We've come a long way Baby! Hell, back in the 1600s, we would have been burned at the stake as a witch if we didn't go along with the oppressive mores.

[Bay Boy]

34. I believe the proper term is ...

...school marm. DOn't hear that much anymore.

[beveeheart]

40. My one-room schoolteacher grandmother was 28 yrs old when she got married

in 1919 and had to give up teaching.

[femmocrat]

15. 11. Buy a house.

And # 9 is still true.

[ismnotwasm]

18. Yup.

A couple steps back on number 9

[lark]

22. Young pregnant women were not allowed in school.

In No. Fl. obviously pregnant girls were not allowed in public highschools until 1970. Young unmarried pregnant girls were usually "sent away". Birth control was only available to married women and was mostly unavailable to unmarried women no matter the age and never to teenage unmarried women. Abortions were only available in NY. and CA. My sister needed an abortion, the fetus had died, but because she was 17 & unmarried her doctor said he'd have to inform mom if she had the abortion and she'd die without it. Me and her friends chipped in and got the money together for her to have this procedure and it was almost too late.

Thank God for progress! Looking forward to the day that the Repugs war against women ends.

[HockeyMom]

32. Catholic school in the 60s

Married, pregnant teacher was told to take a leave of absense when she started to show. Duh, she was doing precisely what the Catholic Church wanted her to do; marry and make babies. Wasn't that a good example to teenage Catholic girls? lol

Thank goodness, workplace a couple of years later didn't think like that.

[EC]

23. Charge card?

Hell, you couldn't even get a savings account without your husbands permission if you were married. Single women could get a savings account but if you were married you needed the husbands signature. Buying a home was impossible. Abortion? We couldn't even have birth control until the 70's and then again, only married with the husband's permission.

You not only lost your job if you got pregnant, you were not eligible to collect unemployment either.

There were so many other things I don't remember just now that are not as trivial as "reading Ms. Magazine" which didn't even exist then.

[ismnotwasm]

24. That 'read MS' magazine was silly

Especially in light of the actual history.

[northoftheborder]

31. In 1956, you could not continue teaching when you were....

.....far enough into pregnancy to wear maternity clothes, and you could not then return to teaching until child was 2 years old.... I don't know how late that policy lasted. I never went back into teaching.

[HockeyMom]

35. I wasn't married

when I got the credit card, and KEPT IT in my unmarried name after. I also still had a bank account in my unmarried name. Oh, HORROR! As I said I lived in NYC. I went on the Pill in 1968, and actually worked for the pharm. that manufactured it. I got it free with a script. Again, at the same corporation, I got pg in 1978. and nobody fired me. They asked if I wanted to return after maternity leave. lol Imagine that?

DAMN, I am grateful I lived in NYC back. Rest of the country sounds like the 17th Century in comparison.

[Sherman A1]

38. Don't know about that one.

My Mom who was divorced in 1964 after many years of separation from my Dad. Had a checking account, a house, a savings account (granted not much in it as a single Mom) and several charge cards.

[DesertFlower]

48. i got an IUD without my husband's permission

in '64. i went to the clinic at mt. sinai hospital and it only cost $10. no questions asked.

[Mojorabbit]

54. Needed husbands signature on consent form if you needed a hysterectomy too

I was appalled as a young nurse when I found that out. This was in the late seventies.

[fasttense]

58. When I moved to Puerto Rico in in 1987

I needed my husband signature to open my bank account.

But at least there they had no problem with the fact that my husband and I have different last names. I kept my maiden name. Here in the states everyone just assumes my husband and I are not married. We have to show our marriage certificate for the strangest things.

[MsPithy]

33. Not get a tubal ligation without her husband's permission,

is another one. Single women could have this sterilization operation at all, OB/Gyne doctors wouldn't do it.

This did not change at the hospital where I worked until the late 70's when some young women attendings joined the staff. They treated their patients like adults and the male docs noticed they were losing patients to these women. If there ever was a written policy, which I doubt, it changed overnight.

[HockeyMom]

36. Ah, I had to give MY permission for husband's Vasectomy in 84

and listen to a lecture, and wait 24 hours. We were 35, married 10 years, with 2 kids. We BOTH gave it that doctor and almost walked out.

[Cleita]

37. Not entirely true. As working girl in the sixties, many of my co-workers

did get pregnant and they did keep their jobs. They just didn't get paid for maternity leave while they were off work. We could report sexual harassment in the workplace. It's just that nothing was done about it, but since we reported to female personnel officers in bigger companies, those women would transfer you to other departments and often replaced you with another older, perhaps married woman. Harassers were lest likely to harass married women because there was that husband lurking in the background. I had a credit card from the time I was twenty-two and by 1970 when I became thirty years old, I had twelve of them, including Diner's Club. Most of my married friends could and did refuse sex with their husbands when they didn't want it.

What we didn't get were equal wages, nor promotions to the really good jobs. I often found myself doing the same work as my male co-workers, but couldn't use my name and title on correspondence because it was felt clients wouldn't take me seriously, so I had to use a co-workers name and have him sign any correspondence necessary for business, and of course, I was paid a third less than they were. I guess it depended in what state you lived and worked in. Since I was in California in that decade, Californians were always ahead of the rest of the country.

[ismnotwasm]

56. Again the point of the article is to point out that legislation was not in place until the 70's

1. Keep her job if she was pregnant.
Until the Pregnancy Discrimination Act in 1978, women could be fired from their workplace for being pregnant.


The first time that a court recognized sexual harassment in the workplace was in 1977 and it wasn’t until 1980 that sexual harassment was officially defined by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

But all these stories are awesome, it's women's experiences from different POV, and they're all powerful to hear about

[MoreGOPoop]

39. My Aunt's husband

beat her to a bloody pulp in 1968 because she didn't want
to have sex. The judge ruled against her because rape
(no matter how brutal) by a husband "doesn't exist".

Somewhere around then Gloria Steinem became my hero.

[BainsBane]

41. Well, it seems more than five people agree with you

I'm sure that will go deliberately unnoticed by the anti-feminists who insist there are only a handful of us.

[ismnotwasm]

55. Heh!

This is interesting though, so many memories posted.

[RVN VET]

42. A married female Federal employee couldn't leave her husband a survivor annuity

when she retired unless she proved that he was unable to support himself. Her income was, of course, secondary to his, you see. He, of course, could leave a survivor annuity to her.

[DesertFlower]

47. i got my first credit card in my name in '67.

i was recently separated and opened a checking account with citibank. a few months later they sent me "the everything card" which eventually became visa.

[Just Saying]

49. Thank you!

We take so much for granted.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

51. I could not wear slacks to school, even when it was cold.

I hated skirts. They were not modest.
I graduated from high school in 1972. Our control freak admins tried to prevent us from wearing long skirts in the winter.

[hollysmom]

53. I was offered 2 credit cards in 1967.

I didn't take them though, I was trying to live semi off the grid - but I had a job and that is where the credit card companies got my name. Interestingly enough, I could not afford a phone, makes it hard for looking fora job - because a single woman had to put a deposit of 200 dollars down, a single man did not, and married people did not. So put get a phone unless they were rich down there. I made 5K a year before taxes (I think about 60 a week after taxes) at that time and owned 3 dresses for work, My friend/apartment mate made 40 dollars a week after taxes.

My mother refused to have sex with my father and I heard it all with my room above their bed - ugh.

I don't think there was anywhere in the country to have a legal abortion unless you were ruled mentally unstable.

[ismnotwasm]

59. Cross- post from GD

OH teacher fired while pregnant to testify

CINCINNATI (AP) — A teacher fired after becoming pregnant through artificial insemination was expected to tell jurors her version of events as the trial in her lawsuit against a Roman Catholic archdiocese and two of its schools entered its second day.

Christa Dias has sued the Archdiocese of Cincinnati and the schools over her 2010 dismissal, contending they fired her simply because she was pregnant and unmarried. Her attorney, Robert Klingler, told a federal jury in opening statements Tuesday that the firing violated federal law prohibiting pregnancy discrimination. The trial was set to continue on Wednesday.

The archdiocese's attorney, Steve Goodin, told jurors "there was no discrimination," saying Dias was fired for violating a contract that he says required her to abide by Catholic doctrine. The archdiocese has said that artificial insemination violates that doctrine and is immoral.

Dias, who is not Catholic, alleges in her lawsuit that church policy is not enforced equally against men and women. A man formerly employed in youth ministry at a suburban Dayton parish within the archdiocese testified in a sworn video deposition Tuesday. He testified that some church officials were aware that he and his wife used artificial insemination when they were trying to have a child and that he was not fired or disciplined in any way.