BLAZING STRADDLES

In the space of only a few days, a 12 year-old Vermont girl was reported missing, frantically searched for and finally found dead. Internet’s, My Space, was implicated; a sex ring preying on young girls was suggested and the girl’s uncle was revealed as a serial sex offender and charged with kidnapping. The investigation continues.

Lots of sadness and tears; lots of hand wringing and questioning of the judicial system as the investigation continues but really nothing new, no insight. No one speaks of why we train our girls to be victims; needing and wanting the attention of a male to give them significance.

Men’s religion has played a major role in the subjugation of and crimes against women – this is still going on and is a major reason why church and state must be kept separate.

Bruce Ware — a Southern Baptist scholar – argued that one reason that men abuse their wives is because women rebel against their husband’s God-given authority: “‘And husbands on their parts, because they’re sinners, now respond to that threat to their authority either by being abusive, which is of course one of the ways men can respond when their authority is challenged - -or, more commonly, to become passive, acquiescent, and simply not asserting the leadership they ought to as men in their homes and in churches,’ Ware said from the pulpit of Denton Bible Church in Denton, Texas.”

Now the presumptive choice of the DNC and the mean street media, Zelig Obama, has announced that he will continue George Bush’s faith based initiatives – that have melded church and state together.

BO has made many promises regarding women’s rights, reproductive and otherwise but in the light of his several position changes in order to appeal to everyone, women will surely also be a casualty of his blazing straddles, outright lies and prevarications. No wonder he hasn’t clarified his core values and his beliefs, like Zelig, he has none – he just reflects whatever group he’s trying to impress.
http://www.puma08.com/2008/07/05/puma-call-to-dnc-delegates/

“[W]ho will Obama throw under the bus next? Hmmm…already under the bus: women, old people, baby boomers, the Clinton Administration, his grandmother, Rev. Wright, Fr. Phleger, Tony Rezko, Samantha Power, various and sundry other staff members, the LGBT community, Muslims, supporters of Israel, Appalachia, African American men, the Great Possum Seal, Cuban-Americans, Wesley Clark, Moveon.org, the fourth amendment, the establishment clause…who’s next?” -- (bostonboomer at The Confluence)

“Women do not get into positions of power without the aid of men in this man’s world, and neither do men. Men trade on the connections they make in fraternities, golf clubs, and strip clubs. And people want to criticize women for trading on the connections that are available to us? In the entire history of this patriarchal nation, a mere 2 percent of all Congress-members have been women. If we eliminate all the women who became Congresswomen because of their connections to husbands, that embarrassingly pitiful percentage declines considerably.” – egalia

***Don’t miss this one:

Destroying Hillary Clinton by Melissa McEwan and Maureen McCluskey
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/01/hillaryclinton.uselections2008
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Another blast from the past:
GenderGappers 1997 – 002

YOU MEAN WE HAD ForeMOTHERS, TOO?
After thousands of years of existence in virtual slavery, woman began to actively demand that they be considered and treated as adult human beings at around the turn of this century.

We shall generalize these dates since any of you that want specifics can easily find them on the Internet. Except for some women's studies, you won't find this taught in schools.

Our calendar is based on marking year one as the year Jesus Christ was born. It took the advent of women's scholarship and archaeological interpretation to reveal, in our current century, that there once lived a people who worshipped both Goddess and God. We now learn that these Goddess-worshipping tribes practiced gender equity -- women were High Priests and doctors; were free beings; were educated and could own property.

These tribes were peaceful and prosperous for their time. This changed when these peaceful villages were overrun by tribes who worshipped a male God exclusively. Under the rule of this God, women were condemned to a slavery that persisted for nearly all women until around the beginning of the 20th Century. Women were the property of their father, given by him to their husband to do with as he wished. They could not own property, were not considered to be educable or even to have human abilities -- all because men believed that God's word declared that woman caused the fall of man in the Garden of Eden.

This belief was enforced throughout the centuries by Paul's gospel, witch hunts, cultural and societal mandates as well as the meting out of harsh punishment if a woman stepped out of her male-god-established role. Throughout those thousands of years, most men were free to develop while women's development was suffocated.

This century has seen a massive change in the lives of women, who have so far, been given fewer than 100 years to catch up to a system that men had thousands of years to grow, use and interact with.

While most women were restricted to children and home, most men were bonding in government, education, law, fraternal organizations, military, sport, finance, uniform dress etc. Women led their lives vicariously through men, developing methods of placating and pleasing men -- and many still carry the results of that programming of thousands of years.

Some of the fiercest defenders of gender inequity are women -- women who will not or cannot seek the counsel of the Goddess within.

Whoopi Goldberg, who most would consider a liberated woman, made the following statement in a TV interview: "Black people are the only people who came to this country and were not allowed to vote."

Whoops, Whoopi - women of any skin color are people too. We have been coming to this country since the 17th Century and weren't allowed to vote either -- not until early in the 1920's (excepting a couple of state elections.)

And all our foremothers before them, before us, lie in their sacrificial graves unsung and unremembered.
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