Small ‘p’ Patriarchy Moments as a Gen Xer

Understanding the moments and passing the torch to Gen Z

“Women are allowed to wear slacks here now,” my supervisor said. He rolled his eyes almost imperceptibly.

We were walking down the hallway to my new office. I’d just been hired full-time at an ad agency as a junior account executive on the Wendy’s business, after working there as an intern for six months. I knew everyone already, which made the transition easier.

But women were allowed to wear slacks? What the hell? It was 1999. Surely we were past the clothing police.

I’m a feral Gen Xer who did what the boys did — and often did it better. I’d played boys’ baseball until middle school. Pitcher, then first base. They called me Stretch because nothing got by me. I loved skateboarding and tossing a football, mucked horse stalls, and in general, had become as self-reliant as a latch-key kid possibly could.

And of course, Gen Xers are the Goonies and Adventures in Babysitting generation, getting shit done despite the adults in our lives. We just went for it. Bike across town? Sure. Chase down a pirate ship? Of course.

So my response to my supervisor was genuine confusion.

“Wait, what?”

He explained that because our client, Wendy’s, was very conservative, our attire had been as well. Men wore suits, women wore skirts and pantyhose. It was like Mad Men minus the smoking.

“But that ended a few years ago,” he said, smirking slightly, acknowledging how ridiculous it was. “Wear business casual.”

Unsurprisingly, the relationship with our client was by default a boys’ club. Men were in charge both at our agency and at Wendy’s. A female colleague and I discussed the imbalance at times, and took to wearing power heels so that we towered over most of the men. We did our jobs to perfection. We were always prepared, always a step ahead if we could help it.

One day, she and I were mulling over how the guys would take our male clients golfing. We were a few miles from the legendary Muirfield Village Club, and when the weather was nice, golfing was a weekly occurrence. We didn’t golf and had zero interest in learning.

So, what could we do? What did we want to do?

Complaining was out of the question. Our training to be solutions-oriented would apply to this problem as it did to everything else at the agency. After a few minutes, the answer seemed obvious: we’d take our female clients out for margaritas or cocktails once a month. This was quickly approved by our boss.

“That’s a great idea,” he said. “I don’t know why we’ve never thought of it before.”

After this incident, I started dating someone whose mother once told me, after several glasses of wine, that she’d pack up the kids and drive around, fed up with her husband, dreaming of leaving him. But where would she go? How would she survive? This was in the ’60s and ’70s.

I wasn’t sure why she didn’t just file for divorce and get a job, because what I didn’t know then could fill up a small book.

It occurred to me that this piece of information dovetailed with some of my mother’s attitudes. She was a single mother and believed my career choices, even in the 90’s, were limited to teacher, nurse, or secretary. She’d wanted me to marry my high school boyfriend, who was controlling, because I’d “never find another nice man to take care of me.”

So I did some research and learned that women couldn’t even have their own credit cards or loans, separate from their husbands, until 1974 — the year I was born. Establishing an independent life was not just difficult, but almost impossible, unless you had help from family.

This floored me. I could now see the history and importance of women’s rights issues more clearly, the milestones of progress compressed into my own lifetime. They were no longer “the past.” The past was the present.

Why didn’t we as a society talk about this more? Teach it in high school?

Now that I’ve gotten older and wiser, of course, I’ve read enough, seen enough, to understand the systemic oppression of Blacks, women, LGBTQ+, by the white patriarchy in America — and it of course includes a careful curation for school books.

At the time though, I didn’t understand I was experiencing misogyny directly, or experiencing the echoes of it, at the times they happened. I didn’t know enough to fully appreciate how past suppression of women echoes in our lives today.

How could I have gotten there faster?

My sixteen year old daughter is like I was that age — oblivious to how women’s rights affect her daily life, taking the progress her generation sees for granted. Intellectually, she gets it, like I did.

But I want her to understand the milestone moments in her life as they happen, as we’re more able to as adults. Ambitious, I know. She’s a smart and aware kid, but she’s also deep in her own teenager life.

So I tell her the history of women’s rights, dropping a fact here and there, and ask her if she’s heard the latest insane ruling that threatens our bodily autonomy. We attended the Women’s March, and the PRIDE parade a few times.

I know Gen Z is going to do great things — it’s a big reason why the right is passing every restrictive bill they possibly can.

They’re afraid of our kids. And they should be.

These kids are being raised by Gen Xers.

Hi! My name is Diane and I’m a mom, writer, content marketer, and outdoor enthusiast navigating this chaotic and often ridiculous world while dealing with POTS, chronic EBV, and overactive mast cells.

I write about many things, including the craft of writing, chronic conditions, work and career shenanigans, and life outside my front door (which is behind an active Seattle bus stop!).