Many of us are aware of feminism. While it’s been known to clash with other ideologies, typically speaking, it’s a movement that has been used to promote women’s rights. From equal education and equal pay, to the right to not be sexually harassed and discriminated against, feminism encompasses a variety of different ideas. It’s a loose conglomeration of different individuals that have taken to fighting for their right to a good existence in this world. Contrary to popular belief, the movement is made up of both men and women, and has been promoted by various political and social figures alike. The Stepford Wives, ironically enough, encourages feminism as well.

The Stepford Wives is a novel by Ira Levin. It begins with a town named Stepford, where all the wives are supportive, beautiful, and most importantly, submissive. Photographer Joanna Eberhart, with her husband and children, move to Stepford. While she’s initially excited about the move, she becomes disturbed as her once free-thinking, independent friends slowly turn into zombie-like wives who can’t think for themselves, just like the other wives in Stepford. As her fears continue to manifest, her husband simply mocks her, all the while spending more and more time at the men’s meeting. She tries to escape with her children, but her husband manages to stop her. In the end, she was eventually captured by the town’s men, and was forced to become yet another Stepford housewife.

As you may or may not know, The Stepford Wives is a satirical novel that has garnered the attention of millions. The novel has been used to mock submissive wives in general, as well as the “Cult of Domesticity”, a term that refers to how women should be submissive in general, and put their husbands' needs before their own. It was a term used to describe the higher classes in the US back then, of the expectation that women were supposed to be under their husband’s rule. They were considered to be a “light off the home”. In fact, the term “Stepford wife” didn’t even emerge until after the book was published.

What’s more, the book was used to make fun of forced gender roles. While gender roles aren’t necessarily a bad thing, forcing someone to conform to a specific type of behavior, just so that it builds our shattered egos, is something not many people would support. At the very least, it’s ridiculous, and at worst, it’s humiliating. The book promotes the idea that human beings (when they can) are given free will, and as such, this should be used in a way that helps both themselves and society. If we dominate others just because we believe it’s our right to do so means we’re giving in to our baser instincts.

The Stepford Wives has impacted our culture in a way that forced us to take another look at these gender roles. It was so influential that several adaptations were made, including The Stepford Children in 1987, and The Stepford Husbands in 1996, which reversed the roles in which the children and the husbands were replaced by perfect human beings. It’s a novel that continues to challenge us today, to treat each other with respect and kindness, rather than fear and contempt.