When Everything Changed By Gail Collins

 When Everything Changed: The Amazing Journey of American Women From 1960 to the Present By Gail Collins

This was one of the text books that were a required read for my graduate class on American women's history. First off let's look at Gail Collins who is a professional journalist and a woman. So being a woman or a journalist doesn't make her a subject matter expert, but both could help her get access to what she needed for the book and to add an emotional level to the book. Just because she is a woman doesn't make her an expert on women because life experiences makes each story different, but she does have a lot of references that she used and the research does look relatively extensive. Also the historian in me didn't see any red flags with what she was presenting and she put everything together in a way that is easy to read.

The book itself I felt was good. I actually found myself tearing up every now and then including when she was writing about things that have not really improved much even today. Women's rights in the US are going backwards due to a huge religious push from people that thinks it is right to force their religious beliefs on people and strip those people of the rights over their own bodies. The conservative party in the US are acting to take away the rights of people and the worst part are the women members that are joining in undoing everything that the women that came before them had fought so hard to get. This is why I was personally impacted while reading this book. It showed both how far we have came and how much we are being pushed back down. It was also great that she looked at a diverse group of women and even different sexualities. I would recommend this book to people that are both interested in women's studies and American history. I am really glad that this book was a part of my graduate program. 

Notes:

-One of the things that stood out to me was how white women trying to help the black movements/organizations were forced to stay behind in the office typing instead of going out into the community and doing what other black activists were doing by the people they were trying to support (147). It showed how there was racism coming blacks/African Americans against even the people that was trying to help them. Also in this section Josie Bass was quoted saying, "But part of my anger of racism was the anger of how black men treated black women and blamed it on racism" (147). This also showed how racism is used to then justify hurting other groups and minorities. Racism is used as a scapegoat a lot of the time to justify actions that should not happen for any reason. 

-Another thing that stood out was the fight over how feminists dressed even within the group (202). Even Betty Friedan got in on it. To me this went back to focusing too much on physical appearance. It shouldn't matter how someone looks. Women should be able to dress however they feel and still be given the same respect. There are days I live in sweats and days when I enjoy dressing up. One should not be valued over the other, but this fight that was going on back then is still around today. You can tell this by going shopping in these two different dress styles. You will get better service if you are dress like you are put together (higher cost clothing, makeup, and the like) verses wearing more comfy clothes. I have caught workers following my mother around a store based on how she was dressed until I called them out for it. This is a very classist thing that shows how much of our issues are actually focused on this and the perceptions that people build based on how others look. It is so much more then just race.

-Building off this Collins also does go into body image. One of her lines was really shocking to me. "The American Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons announced in 1983 that there was good reason to believe that small breasts 'are really a disease' since they create 'a total lack of well-being'" (297). This was horrible where people in such a position of perceived power (being a group of doctors) could impact the cultural concept of body image so much. We still have issues with this today where female celebrities have to face their worth being judged by what they look like (this also happens to common people as well).

Overall for me this book showed how we are still fighting many of the issues that the women that came before us have been fighting for not only hundreds, but thousands of years. Every time it looks like we are making progress, something happens and sets us back again.