Second-wave feminism has permeated the vast majority of the western world (and a good chunk of the "non-western" world as well) so deeply and so thoroughly that some of its most basic tenets have been inculcated into the wider public consciousness, and accepted without question and criticism.
For example, if a man were to say "I think that most women would be happier as housewives and stay-at-home mothers than trying to escalate the corporate ladder" a good portion of people, perhaps even the majority (depending on the country and region) would gasp in horror. What an absolutely horrendous and despicable display of misogyny and male chauvinism! Saying something like that is in essence no different from saying "the place of a woman is slaving herself in the kitchen making sandwiches for her husband"! How dare you! Misogynist pig! Outrageous!
If a woman were to say that, feminists (and a good portion of other people) would consider herself naive and deluded, and may even feel pity for her, as if she were an ignorant child who doesn't know what's best for her.
Yet, have you ever heard a single rational argument against that statement? Note that the statement does not say that women should stay at home. It's saying that women would be happier staying at home. Yet, even if you point that out and emphasize it, that doesn't help one iota. Perhaps somewhat ironically it might even make it worse, in the eyes of the average feminism-brainwashed person (especially if an actual leftist).
The fact is that we have become a world where having a career is considered more important than being happy. It's not even a question of "it's better to work hard and build society than to slack off and live at the expense of others". It's genuinely so that happiness has been shoved completely to the sidelines, and having a successful career is considered significantly more important.
There's an underlying sentiment and driving principle in second-wave feminism, which goes way back to the great feminist influencers of the 1950's and 60's, that it's more important for women to drive the cause of feminism than it is for them to be happy. In many cases, when it comes to the speeches, interviews and writings of many of these big-name influential 2nd-wave feminists, this is not just implied, or read-between-the-lines, or heavy interpretation. Many of them said it directly and outright: Women should avoid being stay-at-home mothers and housewives even if not doing so makes then unhappier, in order to further the cause of feminism. Even if a woman would genuinely be happier as a stay-at-home mother, according to these feminists she should still not do that, and instead seek a career and, preferably, not create a family at all. Even if that means she will be significantly unhappier because of that. The cause of feminism is more important than the happiness of women.
I'm not even making that up. If you research the speeches and writings of many of these 2nd-wave feminists, you'll find them saying pretty much exactly that, quite directly (perhaps not with those exact words, but pretty much effectively the same things).
This sentiment and principle has survived to this day. Even to this day there many, many academics that directly subscribe to this, and oppose so-called "choice feminism" (which would be a form of feminism where women can freely and without any pressure choose their own preferred life styles. If they prefer being stay-at-home mothers, then that's their choice, they should do that, and nobody has a say on it.)
Quite famously (or infamously) Anita Sarkeesian subscribes to this form of 2nd-wave feminism (ie. the one that opposes "choice feminism" and maintains that women should fight for feminism even if that means making life choices that make them less happy, because the fight is more important than their happiness). However, she is by far and large not the only one, and she's just parroting other famous feminist academics who believe in this form of feminism.
But it's not only them. It's the modern leftist social justice ideology in general: You may have heard countless times their myriads of goals, principles, ideas and ideologies. Have you ever heard any of them ever say that women should just be happy?
Sure, if directly asked they might answer in the positive. However, that's never one of the unprompted talking points. They use myriads and myriads of buzzwords (most of which have lost all their meaning), such as "equality", "equity", "justice", "women's rights", "trans rights", "anti-racism" and so on and so forth. Have you ever heard any of them talking about "happiness"? Because I certainly can't remember a single instance.
"Happiness" is not just an inconsequential insignificant random thing. It was in the past considered such an important thing that it even is mentioned in the Declaration of Independence of the United States, in the very famous adage:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."Indeed, Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness have all been forgotten and discarded by the far left. They do not respect any of the three.
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