Women In America- The Scarlet Letter

In America, the status and role of women in our society has changed multiple times. While women were once only viewed as maids, children bearers, and basically to put it bluntly, objects, today things are much different. Women today can vote, own property, have a job, as well as share the responsibility of a family with another individual. I simply cannot imagine my life if I had to live how many women lived their lives in early America. In an excerpt from The Scarlet Letter beginning on page 246, it states that men should only consider certain women when they are looking for a future spouse. Things such as chastity, sobriety, cleanliness, and beauty are all things that an 1831 article suggested a man look for in a woman that he intends on marrying. This totally struck me as hilarious because nowhere in this suggestion does it mention what a woman should look for in a man or if a woman’s feelings even truly matter. This reinforces the idea that women were once simply known as objects. Luckily, women today are viewed as equal to men and there are rarely significant differences in status between the sexes. The old America was filled with double standards and while there are still instances of this issue, our society seems to be better off today.
    It seems so hard to believe that America has changed so much in only a matter of years. Another excerpt from the book details the idea that women that cheat on their spouses are to be considered prostitutes and just down right filthy. They reason that this idea is acceptable because they believe women are supposed to be the fairer and therefore more delicate sex. Nowhere in this explanation do they mention the idea that men shall be deemed disgusting if they cheat on their wives. This excerpt is a total double standard. It is absolutely ridiculous to believe that a man is not as much at fault for cheating on his wife.
    The last excerpt that I discovered to be rather obnoxious was written in 1765 by a man by the name of William Blackstone. It states that by marriage, the husband and wife become legally one person. The very being and legal existence of the woman is said to have been suspended during the marriage and therefore consolidated to the husband completely. Personally, this statement makes me believe that these men only viewed women as a piece of their property. They basically became owners of their wives under this law, which probably made the men extremely happy and the women rather unhappy. Women are not pieces of property and luckily America gradually became more intelligent about equality. Men and women of America are now considered equal and while I believe it should have always been this way, I just like to remember the idea of better late, than never.