The Big, Bad Lie Almost Every Millennial Woman Believed Growing Up
melissamn | Shutterstock I grew up in a very wealthy neighborhood during the 90s. The 90s were an odd time. On one hand, there was still a seething loathing toward women that could be felt in every corner of the media, especially if you were plus-sized or a woman of color.
On the other hand, the same media that praised the heroin chic aesthetic would talk about how women could “have it all” in those days. Of course, when they said we could “have it all,” they let you know what “it all” meant.
Without fail, upper-middle-class women and wealthy women were expected to “have it all:”
- Kids. Ideally, two to three. A perfect 90s family was a married, straight couple with a boy and a girl. Maybe a boy, a girl, and an extra sibling. Of course, Mother Dearest was expected to raise them and hover around them because this was the beginning of helicopter parenting.
- A Great House. I might be wrong, but I really feel like the 90s were the beginning of a serious boom in home design. You had to be the “hostess with the mostest,” baking all sorts of goodies for the bake sale, plus keeping a spotless house. In upper-class homes, this often meant being the one to hire the cleaning lady two to five times a week. Oh! And don’t forget to be the one to get the minivan detailed.
- A Great Body. Working to keep a home would turn anyone a little raggedy-looking. The 90s, from what I glean, were the first decade where looking great was a must rather than a bonus. This was particularly true in rich families.
- A Booming Career. This was the first round of “Boss Babes,” so to speak. The ideal 90s upper-class wife had a power suit on, but also had her own business. But she was also a homemaker.
As a Millennial woman growing up in the 90s, I believed the lie that we could have it all
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Being a daughter in the 90s meant that you already had your life mapped out for you by everyone around you
You were never told to just find your own way or do your own thing, no. You were told what your future should be, step by step. It became known as the Life Script.
The most innocuous part of this indoctrination was education. College was the be-all, end-all of success pathways. Trade school was akin to failure. Countless moms would push their daughters into college, saying, “Don’t you want to have it all? A career will let you get so many more nice things!”
Looking back, I probably would have been very good in certain trades. But hey, toxic society is going to stay toxic. And while we’re on that topic, let’s talk about other, more venomous aspects of the Life Script: Moms would often pressure their daughters to diet and dress nicely so that a nice boy in college would be interested in them. But the girls couldn’t dress provocatively, though no one ever quite figured out why certain clothes fell in this category on some girls while being totally fine on others.
Then, there was the cooking. Maybe it was just in my town, but there was a divide between girls’ and boys’ scouts. Boy Scouts did outdoor adventures and survival. Girl Scout, well, we made bird houses, topiaries, and learned how to set a table.
Girls were given baby dolls, then told to love them because soon, they’ll have real babies to care for. Girls were told the best thing to be was a babysitter if they needed spare cash. In some circles, being a model was also acceptable. So there you go.
Oh, what if you didn’t want kids? HAHAHAHAHAHA! No one would take you seriously. Some doctors would even bristle at you and say, “Yeah, no one wants them until they meet the Right Guy. So, I’m not going to let you make that decision, because your decision is wrong.”
The lie that women could have it all continued well into the 2000s and 2010s
I started to realize something about “having it all” according to society: at every point, “having it all” required women to work more and sacrifice more. At no point were men told to do the same.
Having it all was a farce. Women who did it all rarely had it all. Rather, they had a million people asking them to do more, be more, and try more. And if they asked for help, it was often met with blank stares or grumbles.
It was servitude and submission wrapped up in a cute outfit. Of course, standards of output also started to ratchet up.
In the past, moms could just toss their kids in the backyard and let them play. Today, that would get a CPS call. In the past, homes didn’t have to look perfectly designed to get a compliment. Today, they do. No matter how much women worked, more standards seemed to pop up, demanding more, more, and more of their time.
Eventually, more and more women just threw up their hands and said, 'I'm tired of this'
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Raising a kid and keeping a clean home are full-time jobs that you can’t even get a day off from. Yet it’s unpaid labor that most women are just expected to handle, even if they are not interested in it.
In the past, men would go to work and earn the majority of the income. Women would mostly focus on the home — though some would also have to have jobs to support their families. Still, men were generally seen as people who provided.
Today, a growing share of households has a female breadwinner. Despite most homes having female primary earners, most male counterparts still do not do their fair share of childcare or home cleaning.
And yet, if women let their figures slip or don’t offer up sizzling intimacy, they’re the ones who get torn to shreds by society. If women lose their minds from overwork, they’re the ones who get punished while people simply ask men why their wives aren’t doing more.
For decades, men were able to extract more labor and wealth from women by dangling eventual reciprocity over them. I ought to know because it’s happened to me, too.
Today, thanks to the internet, the lie of reciprocity has been exposed. Most men never really wanted to do anything for the women they’re with, and women are growing wise to that fact. It’s heartbreaking, but it’s true.
So, all things said and done, is it really that surprising that more and more women are just avoiding “having it all?” Is it really that surprising that statistics show that women are less likely to want a relationship than men are?
Having it all comes with some very fine print
Yes, ladies, you can have it all!
Just…
Well…
What no one tells you about “having it all” is that you can’t have it all unless you have a lot of help — and even then, people will criticize you. Yes, women absolutely can “have it all,” as long as they have people helping them out as paid staff members.
If you try to “have it all” while you’re doing it with a man and some kids? Well, you can still have it all. It’s just that you’ll get everything but sleep and attention paid to your needs.
The having it all movement was messed up on purpose
I don’t think most patriarchal men really thought women could handle kids and the workplace. Then women did. And worse (for them), women got their own agency and started to realize that they didn’t need men.
Women’s freedom to choose their own lives is a major threat to the patriarchy. A career means women can leave their abusers. Kids make it harder to leave. Marriage makes it harder to leave. Shaming makes it harder to find someone decent, even if you’re decent yourself.
Working mom trying to provide for the family? Oh, you don’t love your kid enough to be a stay-at-home parent. Stay-at-home mom? Oh, you’re a leech. Mom who raised six kids but lost her figure? Ugh! How could a man want her? She looks awful!
I can’t help but notice how much the government hates things like paid maternity leave, paid after-school care, or assistance for single moms. I can’t help but notice how many men rail against things like paying child support for the kids they fathered.
The more the system piled onto the plates of women, the more it expected of women. It became a game women could never win, no matter what they did.
It’s almost as if the patriarchy was trying to break women down so they’d go back to being in-house chattel. If it sounds like a conspiracy, it’s because it is one. Unlike other conspiracy theories, this one has evidence to support its truth.
Project 2025 is open about it. That’s why they are trying to restrict birth control and abortion. That’s why they gutted DEI. That’s why they slashed college funding. Most college grads are women.
Personally, my ideal life would be as a housewife. I don’t want to work, but I’m aware that I have to because work is the best way to ensure that I don’t get tied to an abusive person.
Society requires the participation of women to function
Women are the social safety net that keeps families from hitting the streets. Women are the de facto caretakers. Women are the ones who are there when men refuse to do their share.
Society has broken the silent contract it had with women as a collective. And right now? I don’t see any woman who wants to “have it all” the way we were told to have it back in the 90s.
I mean, why would they? By choosing to “have it all” in a society that hates women and uses them, they’re choosing to have nothing for themselves. And frankly, I’m not sure that the social contract can ever be repaired in the same way it once was.
Ossiana Tepfenhart is a writer whose work has been featured in Yahoo, BRIDES, Your Daily Dish, Newtheory Magazine, and others.
