Daisy's Treatment Of Women In The Great Gatsby

Women of Great Gatsby
“The Great Gatsby” was published in 1922. It was written by Scott Fitzgerald. The era of the 1920’s was called “The Roaring Twenties”. In this time period, there were flappers, and women who were criticized by the men in society. Women were restrained in many ways prior to the 1920s, such as not having voting rights. In “Gatsby”, women’s roles in society are emphasized to the point where the reader knows exactly how women were treated back then. They were treated like fools, and like they did not have a say in what they do with their lives. Women’s roles were changing in the 1920s, and this change is reflected in “The Great Gatsby”.
The way women were treated by men in society is brought up multiple times throughout the book. Men cheating on women was normal in the 1920s. Jordan tells Nick that “Tom’s got some woman in New York” (Fitzgerald 15). Daisy has to act like it doesn’t affect her and that she is okay with being cheated on. Women in the past were given no choice. They had to deal with being cheated on.

To give birth to a daughter in that society is even worse, on both the mother and daughter. Daisy tells Nick about when she was pregnant. She says, “She [her daughter] was less than an hour old and Tom was god knows where” (Fitzgerald 16). At the time, Tom was not involved in his own daughter coming into the world, and he leaves Daisy alone so that he can go cheat on her. As Daisy continues the story, she says she cried when she found out it was a girl and says to the nurse, “I’m glad it’s a girl. And I hope she’ll be a fool . . . . a beautiful fool” (Fitzgerald 17). Daisy says that she hopes her daughter will be a fool because that’s how she feels in society. She feels as if every woman is treated unfairly by a man. Daisy’s daughter is growing up to be exactly like Daisy, someone who men take advantage