Single career women have bought a similar line from Playboy, perhaps unwittingly. In 1963, Hefner exhorted men to work harder to become wealthier, buy more consumer goods and keep climbing the golden ladder of opportunity. If we are to believe what the voices in the popular culture tell us, women are equal opportunity consumers. Instead of indulging in stereos, luxury cars and imported whiskey to show off status, they buy Manolo Blahnik shoes to show off the ankle, Botox to enhance the face and boob jobs to improve the curves. The termagant boss in "The Devil Wears Prada," played by Meryl Streep, is not a sympathetic character, but she's based on a real person and there are many like her out there. (I worked for one once at Vogue.)
The feminist revolution was a class revolution and women of the upper class won, if winning means successful careers and lots of money to buy things. But like most things in life, burdens fall hardest on women of the underclass. She's still more likely to have a child out of wedlock and less likely to find a man to provide family and financial support. Her children are less likely to go to college, and without a college degree they're more likely to join the underclass of the next generation. The multigenerational underclass is largely black with overall illegitimacy rates at 70 percent, and closer to 90 percent in the inner cities.
The legacy of slavery, welfare payments that replaced men and fewer opportunities for unskilled work all contributed to this. But the black voices celebrating victimhood are responsible, too. Barack Obama is a phenomenon in large measure because he wants to change that message. In his keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention two years ago, he celebrated inner-city families who "know that parents have to parent, that children can't achieve unless we raise their expectations and turn off the television set, and eradicate the slander that says a black youth with a book is acting white." Such advice might even lead them to the altar.