Chapters 21 and 22

Chapter 21
The thing that was interesting to me about the Great Depression was that when the stock market crashed was the sameday that "eleven of their financers committed suicide." I did not know this but what I did know just from news and talk was that people had lost all their money as well as jobs behinde this. The reason why people had lost all of their money was because the banks had closed due to the depression. I did not relize so much went into keep the coutry running without financil problems. The reduction of unemployment meet the start of a new life and a new start in the economic world. When Mussolini came to power he broke his promise for "social programs and focused on the state power" which then led to the fascists movement. Under this movement were considered to be housewives and nothing but. They were not considered to be equal to men under this movement. I don't think I could live like this unless this all that I knew and nothing else. Hitlers popularity grew because he ended the depression for Germany. Even the Jews liked him.. When he came into power he ended up turning on the jews by basically taking their rights away such as banning them from "universities, restricted their life styles". He even banned them from "professional organizations and civil employment." Soon he enacted a law that said they could not have any sexual relations or marry other Germans. They even had to "identify themselves as a Jew to the public." It was amazing how the Nazi had such controll over the Jews. Their shops were looted by these people and that their were killed in the masses all because they were Jews and Hitler did not like Jews and wanted to get rid of all Jews. The German race soon became the race that dominated in Germany under Hitlers rule because Jews were ostricised there. The lose of so many lives in WWII was very devestating. The numbers killed because of this war was a lot. The women in so many cases in this chapter were basically portrayed as sex slaves. The Jewish women in hitlers time were often raped just because they were Jews. The Chinese women were sexually assaulted during WWII. The women in the japanese cultural during this time strayer says as comfort women to the Japanese soldiers. They often had to satisfy many men in one day. This is not unlike a what we call prostitutes today. The only difference is that back then it was not done for many and they were forced where as to day they get paid for what they do. This was a very violent time during our history. Many lives were taken and there was a lot of blood shed. The end of WWII only ended up in a lot of blood shed as well. Two major cities were bombed killing even women and children living in those towns.
Chapter 23
I have heard of the cold war before but was surprised by the date the it ended. That is probably due to my age. I was still only in my sophomore year in high school when it ended. I always wondered why when two countries don't agree on something they always have to go to war. We are an example in that we (United States) and the USSR did not get along it scared children to the point hey were getting under tables during the drills. We were able to end our rivalry peacefully. What I did not know that back before the 1900's women had to take the surnames of their husbands when they got married and that their were not allowed the to take leave when they got pregnant. I cant imagine the working conditions that they had to endure while pregnant, that is if they worked at all. I am proud that we had the Feminist movement that spread to allow us to have the privileges that we have today. Around this time in the 1900's during the feminist movement more and more things were starting to involve and cater to women where as before it did not. More and more women were being trained to do the jobs that men typically had. This is all in the Communist Feminism. The Zhenotdel organization was soon "abolished by Stalin. He was not happy that women were able to have a voice and have the same rights of men. He felt that the women should still be in the domesticated roles and the Zhenotdel organization was too aggressive in the way they did things so they needed to be stopped. After they were abolished the Women's Federation came about to give women those same rights and put them in leadership roles. This Federation was less aggressive then the Zhenotdel organization. The women got what they wanted with limits. With US being one of the only threatening countries to have nuclear weapons the Soviet Union soon became scared and started to seek to get their own nuclear weapons and soon succeeded in 1949. This was an interesting chapter to read because so much of what happened carried over into the late 1900's. I may have been young doing this time but I still remember hearing some of these things on the news. It is amazing what we take for granted no and days when people back then even up to now have so little.