“so you’re saying now instead of dealing with their problem’s they’re running away from it?”
No, they could not deal with their problems, because they had no SAY in anything then. Women were chattel, like any other property of their husbands. Men made ALL the decisions, and women were expected to bow to their will. Of course, the men ALSO brought home the kosher meat and potatoes. Were they NOT the breadwinners, the women would have had NO one to take care of them, and where, after all, WOULD they go, even if their husbands WERE abusive? Abuse was virtually NEVER spoken of anywhere. Even to this day, it is underreported and considered shameful if someone speaks out about it.
There were few divorces, because the stigma of divorce was so awful in those years. Women bore abusive, or even merely unhappy and unfulfilling marriages, because the alternative was even more scary to them. they did so because of the “shanda” of being divorced. And what would they do with the children? Who would want to marry them? And even today, don’t people often shy away from a shidduch from a broken home, though it is surely not the child’s fault that the parents didn’t stay married to each other?
Women were so financially, emotionally, physically, and in every way dependent upon their husbands then, that it took great courage to walk away from a bad situation. When women got the right to vote, the right to earn their own living, the right to be paid equally (still working on that one) with men working in the same job, they also got more options. Some may not like this, but I guarantee you, this is not going away any time soon. Women are educated and world-savvy now, and there is no going back to the good ole days, which in some respects weren’t quite as good as we like to think.