You’ve Come a Long Way Baby, but Not Really
An Open Letter to the woman who paid my Gen Z sister less at a summer camp for not knowing how to operate a power tool.
Virginia Slims: maker of the revolutionary cigarette for women, femtervising trailblazer, and the company that coined the legendary feminist slogan “You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby!”
If you haven’t seen this ad before, I don’t blame you. I don’t read magazines from the ’70s either… but as a millennial woman who’s never known anything other than a modern and progressive era — I find everything about this ad fascinating and thought-provoking.
Subject matter aside, the slogan was meant to signal a change in thought, the end of an archaic period and the start of a new era — one where women could make their own choices and participate on an equal playing field.
As millennial women and beyond, we must appreciate the state of gender equality in comparison to what it used to be — but we also must not let go of the fact that women are still frequently subjected to the detrimental gender norms of the past.
This era is not nearly as modern, or progressive, as our foremothers dreamt it would be.
