In my opinion, “What I’ve Learned from Men,” was by far, the most powerful essay of the six we read. The essay discusses the things that women should learn from men. The essay explains how women need to toughen up, and start taking credit for their accomplishments. This essay was very effective because Ehrenreich was both sarcastic, and serious.
As I stated earlier, Ehrenreich talked about how women need to start taking credit for their accomplishments which was a key part of the text. On page 258, Ehrenreich says, “ By putting herself down, a woman avoids feeling brazenly powerful and potentially “selfish” ; she also does the traditional lady’s work of trying to make everyone feel better (She’s not really so smart after all, just lucky” ). This is a problem I see in a lot of women. Many women, don’t take credit for anything they accomplish. They say that they just got lucky as if they didn’t work hard to accomplish what they worked for. It’s almost like they are trying to give credit to men for everything even though they work just as hard. I think a lot of fell obligated to do a lot of work, but not to take any credit for it. On page 258, Ehrenreich says, “ I think women should stop taking responsibility for every human interaction we engage in. In a social encounter with a woman, the average man can go 25 minutes without saying nothing more than “ You don’t say?” “Izzat so?” and, of course, “Hmmmm.” This is something I see a lot in my everyday life. Especially with myparents. My mom can talk for roughly five minutes without my dad saying anything but, “ wow” “yeah” and “hmmmm.” I’ve always wondered why this happened. Are women naturally more talkative or do men just feel like they don’t need to talk. Whatever the reason, women need to talk less and men need to talk more.
I really enjoyed this essay because it’s easy to relate to. I think more men and women should read it because it helps create a greater