Epilogue Summary and Analysis

The unremitting 1980s backlash fails to stop women from entering the workforce or follow other social dictates. Bruised and discouraged, Riggs and other women know there is nowhere to go but forward. Many heed the "little voice" inside that calls for self-expression, and find a niche that does not conflict with the backlash message. Others sink deeper into their ruts and wait for the world to take pity on women. In the 1980s, women do not mobilize like the suffragists and the Women's Strike for Equality in 1970; instead, they go back to worrying about "offending men". Men cling to their macho role because women expect it and affect their expected demeanor. Where women work together, vocally and unapologetically in the 1980s, they change the minds of many individual men, particularly on abortion politics, through the largest demonstration ever in Washington, DC...