Sex, 1960-1970

While America continued the fighting in the Vietnam War, American soon found itself in a two battle front war.  As America troops in Vietnam fought the Southeast front, America civilians battled against the current social and cultural norms of American society.  With the assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, American people supporting the Vietnam War less with each new rally, Watergate, and price inflation through the “sixties” and “seventies”, America seemed to be at war within itself as the Civil Rights Movement and the Sexual Revolution took America in a firestorm.  Mike Nichols’s The Graduate, 1967, and John Updike’s Rabbit is Rich, 1981, are reactionary sources of this great upheaval in America, depicting in the greatest sense the social and cultural influences of the Sexual Revolution by acting as primary insight into the cultural history of the “sixties” and “seventies”.

From early 1960s through the mid-1970s American society became synonymous with an anti-establishment cultural as the Civil Rights Movement and Sexual Revolution sustained the ideal of rebellion.  Within Nichol’s The Graduate and Updike’s Rabbit is Rich, the opposition of the traditional ideologies of American society happens through the challenging of sexual desire among women.[1]  Women of the “sixties” and “seventies” began to experiment with their roles in society and cultural.  No longer content with roles as home-makers, American women began working outside of the home, either Nichol’s or Updike’s work truly depict this behavior of women.  Along with the questioning of women’s role in American society, women’s sexual desire became the forefront of the Sexual Revolution.  “At the core of the sexual revolution was the concept—radical at the time—that women, just like men, enjoyed sex and had sexual needs”.[2]  No longer hidden away in the dark, women expressed their sexual desire as a man’s desire for sex.  Mrs. Robinson’s attempt at seducing Ben for the first is reflective of a new found sexual desire for women of the “sixties”.[3] Ben’s responds to this first attempt of seduction is also nearly indicative of American Society struggling to understand during the Sexual Revolution women’s sexual cravings.[4]  Contemporaries either struggled with the new idea of women becoming more sexually promiscuous, as it seemed, or embraced it along with the adult films in theaters.  No longer was sex seen as a means to procreate.[5]  In Rabbit is Rich, Rabbit experiences female promiscuity first hand as the aging middle-class white male finds himself taking part of swinging.[6]  Rabbit is surprised to find that “sweet Cindy could be so dirty” as Rabbit admires her photos in the drawer while at Webb’s house.[7]  Women seemed to be freed by the new sense of sexual identity, freed from everyday life.  A sense of empowerment was given to women through 1960 to 1970 as women discarded their old roles as child bearers in exchange for sex as recreational.[8]  Mrs. Robinson’s affair with Ben seems to amplify such claims.

Behavior of American women alone did not allow the Sexual Revolution to endure as throughout the “sixties” and “seventies”.  With the manufacturing and wide scale sale of the Pill, contemporaries feared that the Pill was the cause of the Sexual Revolution.  The Pill did allow women to take more control of their sex lives in deciding their fertility, although other forms of contraception were used before the pill.[9]  Although a double standard fell on women, as it was deemed okay for single men to be sexually active yet not seen as moral for single women to participate in similar behavior.[10] Conservative contemporaries theorized “that the risk of pregnancy and the stigma that went along with it prevented single women from having sex and married women from having affair”.[11]  Although the theory may sound compelling it fails to stand against the affairs of Janice and the pregnancy carried by Pru.[12]  In Janice’s affair, the tying of tubes more than likely was her form of contraception in her affair with Ronnie whereas Pru’s pregnancy sheds light that not sexually active women took birth control.  However, in Updike’s novel, birth control is hinted at being used correctly when Cindy either agrees or disagrees to taking it.

While female sexual desires became more open, society’s view of women’s bodies changed in response it seems to the growing need of open sex.  Adult movies were publically advertised on billboards.  In correlation to women’s open sexual activity, “Hugh Hefner put out a racy new magazine called Playboy that promoted bachelorhood and the swinging single life style”.[13]  Updike’s Rabbit is Rich reflects this theory by the way Rabbit views each female he encounters in a sexual way with exception of his wife from time to time and his mother-in-law.  Rabbit may be a reaction of society’s view of the female body during the revolution. As females acted more openly about their own sexuality it seems by Rabbit serving as a mirror to American culture, women’s bodies became more open as well.  While porn was advertised openly on the streets, it cannot go without a doubt that along with Rabbit’s thoughts being captivated by the women he encounters in such fashion that American cultural need the same.  It is arguable that even the lusting of Rabbit’s thoughts are deemed empowering to the women he fantasizes about “fucking”.[14]  In much the same way the Pill gave women control over their own bodies, Rabbit’s thoughts as well as American society’s views of the female body gives women control over men’s minds.  As Rabbit is Rich, it is clear by Rabbit’s constant break of thought to describe a woman’s body is claim enough to their power over him and thus more power than women had before—the tool, sex.  An era before women held little to no power even over their daily lives.  With the use of sex, women gained empowerment over men and their social constraints.

Between 1960 and 1970 America struggled as it faced a two front war; one war against communism and another war on the home front against the rapid expansion of female sexuality.  As the country faced a failing war abroad it seemed to also be failing a battle against the current social restrains America had placed on its female citizens and a new wave anti-establishment regarding sex.  With the aid of technology and female conduct during the “sixties” through “seventies”, American cultural shifted to a more loosen view of values in regards of sex thus allowing women to take a new role in social interactions.  Reactionary pieces, Mike Nichols’s The Graduate and John Updike’s Rabbit is Rich illustrate an era of disruption in America as social and cultural shift due in part to stimuli of a Sexual Revolution.

[1] The Graduate. Dir. Mike Nichol. Perf. Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft. Embassy Pictures, 1967. Netflix.

[2] PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 18 Apr. 2015.

[3] The Graduate. Dir. Mike Nichol. Perf. Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft. Embassy Pictures, 1967. Netflix.

[4]Ibid.

[5] PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 18 Apr. 2015.

[6] Updike, John. Rabbit is Rich. New York: Knopf, 1981. Print.

[7] Ibid., 180.

[8] PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 18 Apr. 2015.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Ibid.

[11] Ibid.

[12] Updike, John. Rabbit is Rich. New York: Knopf, 1981. Print.

[13] PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 18 Apr. 2015.

[14] Updike, John. Rabbit is Rich. New York: Knopf, 1981. Print.

Triangle’s Argument for Urban Liberalism

In his book Triangle: The Fire that Changed America, David Von Drehle pulls the reader back to the events of an era that transformed American policy in regards of worker safety as well as trapping the reader in vivid detail with the actions of the 146 factory workers that perished the night of March 25, 1911 during the flames of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory.  While the tragedy is most noted as acting as a catalysis for worker safety and building reform, Von Drehle brilliantly argues throughout his book the notion of Urban Liberalism, the idea of the rising of the Middle Class.  “[The] book is one more attempt to open up the horror of the Triangle fire, to gaze intently and unflinchingly at it, and to settle on the facts and their meaning” (Von Drehle 5).  Von Drehle works around the pivotal event, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, using it as a central point to rotate his evidence around.  His evidence-the migrant workers, from factory workers to Tammany Hall elites, featured throughout the book seem to gravitate towards the inevitable tragedy of the Triangle Fire.

Von Dehle’s central theme of Urban Liberalism is told through his wondrous use of a novelistic style writing, allowing for the reader to experience the story, what Von Dehle wished to portray rather than a seemly endless list of facts.  Although the word usage and colorful characters cannot make up for the near inescapable tendentious pages of the policies of the early 1900s-Tammany Hall-before the flames.  The book wins over the reader with its novel like appearance and the steady flow of story lines that all interconnect or meet at the same goal.

As the book progresses through chapter after chapter, it is clear rather quickly that the Working Class is rising to power.  It is first apparent that there has been an elevation in class as the work mentions the now “old” migrants whom have paved the streets and build the factories that the “new” migrants find themselves apart of as they enter America during the Progressive Era.  Urban Liberalism carried both waves of immigrants to power either by business or reform-the Middle Class will have the control.  While the “new” migrants of America found themselves exploited, they proceeded to climb the social or economic “ladder” by means of protests and strikes.  In conjunction, the “old” migrants found themselves losing profits quickly in a highly competitive market.  The answer to add money to the pocketbooks in times where strikers caused a loss of revenue for factory owners was fire.  Fire is simply business-quick “harmless” way to get rid of extra inventory and cash in on the insurance policy.  As Von Drehle further explains in his book, the policy and politics of the era where build the correct way for such a tragedy to happen.  To the factories it was more profitable to burn inventory than to invest in fire safety standards or worker safe environments.

Von Drehle closes his work summing up the events and the lives he included within the two covers as he used them to build up his argument.  In the end it is Urban Liberalism that does come to pass-the rising of the Middle Class to power.  In the days of the trial and after, it is the coming together of both “new” and “old” migrants-Americans-that bring Urban Liberalism to America, and this is what truly changed America.