I couldn’t help but draw parallels to today while reading the two pieces. The heteronormativity aside, it’s interesting how something written more than 50 years ago is still relevant, while the society (at least from a technological, industrial and architectural standpoint) is so different. Many households still face issues in dividing housework and childcare evenly, even when they share the expenditures. I’ve seen a lot of women talk about “weaponized incompetency” and how their male partners say they can’t do certain chores as good as them, or purposely do a bad job so that when the woman complains or does it herself, they can say “oh but you don’t like it even when I try to help”. Pat Mainardi basically says the same thing in so many words.

Similarly, Koedt’s claim how men only see sexual acts as a way of pleasing themselves, and it has rarely anything to do with women still rings true. We have to just look at the porn industry and we can see the evidence. Almost everything is catered to men, usually at the expense of women. We recently even read an essay stating the same. Also, it’s ironic how sex is portrayed as a largely male subject but the burden of contraceptives is almost entirely put on women. Furthermore, the side effects are downplayed or outright accepted as collateral damage when it comes to women, but the same side effects (even less severe) are the reason why male contraceptive pills are still not available. It’s hard not to be frustrated by the glaring unfairness we see in almost very aspect, all the while being accused of exaggerating the sexism we face. Also, the fact that people somehow manage to use women’s liberation to feed their twisted, perverse perspective, like “Equal rights, Equal fights” as a pass to be violent against women, is insane.