I was born in 1954, so what you're talking about is more like my parents generation, but I'll testify that this was all still pretty true when I was young. I came of age in the world of Mad Men. The feminist thing was just ramping up--the first woman X for a million values of X. Educated people in cities still discussed issues like should a woman work after marriage? Women sitting in the car until a man walked around to open the door for her was still a thing. IMO, the "feminist" revolution is a misnomer. It was bigger--it changed everything for men as well. It's a better, happier world today. The changes for men were also profound, just less visible. Gender was a straight jacket for men, too. E.g., the level of daily violence went way, way, down since then. We beat the shit out of each other all the time and nobody blinked. You came home bloody and parent laughed and asked what the other guy looked like. Or you got another smack for fighting. Unnatural, exploitative relationships with the opposite sex, weird artificial standards of masculinity to act out. Many guys barely knew their fathers and feared them to the extent that they did. God help you if you were gay or otherwise of non-regulation gender. Individuals don't really change much after they are adults, so part of it is just waiting for the old people to die out, but as one who was there, I think people are a lot nicer and happier today than back then.