Question

Why does Beauvoir call women the second sex?

Answer 1

• The second sex indicates the second wave of feminism.According to Beauvoir,men have oppressed women by characterizing them at every level,as the "other",defined in opposition to men.
• Men occupy the role of the subject who is essential,while women occupy the role of an object,who is incomplete and mutilated.Men create acts and women wait to get saved by them.
• Women are a disadvantaged sex,who have been suppressed under incompatible myths.Instead of being encouraged to dream and live their lives freely and pursue their goals,women have been made to believe that to be a woman,they have to be for others,especially for men.
• Throughout childhood,we as girls have been made to believe that to succeed as a woman was to succeed at love as succeeding at other thing would make us less lovable.
• Men have been brought to value their independence,whereas women have been presented with a choice to be made between freedom and love,thus making her the second sex.