If the new feminism did not appear on the scene in the 1930s or 40s, this was because the war economy had created new job opportunities for women. But at the end of World War II, returning veterans quickly reclaimed their "rightful places" in the economy, displacing female workers, and millions of women voluntarily took up domesticity and war-deferred motherhood. The young women of the 40s and 50s were living out the social phenomenon that Betty Friedan called the "feminine mystique" and Andrew Sinclair the "new Victorianism." Essentially it amounted to a cultural command to women, which they seemed to accept with enthusiasm, to return to their homes, have large families, lead the cultivated suburban life of status-seeking through domestic attainments, and find self-expression in a variety of avocations. This tendency was bolstered by Freudian psychology as adapted in America and vulgarized through the mass media…What Betty Friedan has described as the "feminine mystique" is essentially the symptom of a cultural lag, in which our societal and personal values are adapted to a family pattern that has long ceased to exist.

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "If the new feminism did not appear on the scene in the 1930s or 40s, this was because the war economy had created new job opportunities for women. But at the end of World War II, returning veterans quickly reclaimed their "rightful places" in the economy, displacing female workers, and millions of women voluntarily took up domesticity and war-deferred motherhood. The young women of the 40s and 50s were living out the social phenomenon that Betty Friedan called the "feminine mystique" and Andrew Sinclair the "new Victorianism." Essentially it amounted to a cultural command to women, which they seemed to accept with enthusiasm, to return to their homes, have large families, lead the cultivated suburban life of status-seeking through domestic attainments, and find self-expression in a variety of avocations. This tendency was bolstered by Freudian psychology as adapted in America and vulgarized through the mass media…What Betty Friedan has described as the "feminine mystique" is essentially the symptom of a cultural lag, in which our societal and personal values are adapted to a family pattern that has long ceased to exist." in the context of "Gerda Lerner, The Majority Finds Its Past: Placing Women in History’’ (1979)" to mean that wisdom is timeless.