What constitutes Misogyny?

[wintler2]

..Also, a set of recommendations could be developed to generally disfavor such thinking style in the broader human culture.

Not to discourage you, but it has been done: sermon on the mount, lao tsu, even the desiderata covers some of this ground. They're maybe not what you had in mind, but we need to think big, as Rene Girard obviously has..

The tonic he proposes, which is necessary and becoming more so to avoid escalating and more brutal outbreaks of violence, and which gets to the third point ^^ up there, is to choose to not participate in the mechanism. At all. Ever. Which means never pointing a finger, accepting losing, giving up desire, refusing to compete, turning the other cheek, in fact.

I can agree in theory, might even reach towards it occassionlly in practice, but .. it is severely maladaptive within business as usual. The only people who will be drawn to this are those whose -ve experiences in power-over/BAU world have overwhelmed their capacity for denial and they have survived. I have a premonition that natural selection is going to be the real convincer, but by all means, lets start a new religion in the meantime.

justdrew you make some good points here. I've changed the emphasis to highlight the ones I think are keenest, restated as questions below:

1. What does lay the foundation for us vs them thinking?

I see it as simply selfinterest - judging others as less deserving/right than myself makes it easier to speak for/dehumanise/control them, especially if you can get a few other selfinterested individuals to go along. I can accept that mirror neurons exist, but i'm not convinced they are the root of it.

2. What are specific real world examples of misogyny?

It keeps coming back to me so i might as well write it, a line from primary school playground: "if they didn't have cunts we'd throw stones at them". Before i even knew what sex was, i had been taught that it was how women were to be valued. This shit has to stop.

3. What response is available to us to disarm groundless bias?

First and maybe only, honour own reaction and revulsion by not suppressing them. Then 'bring it up' if you are game .. but as alot of this thread shows, dialogue can be overrated. I think sincere reaction is actually the best response. Then the exhibitor of the bias can go away and work it out in their own time, and they don't get to project their internal critic onto you.

4. What can be done to reform the thinking style of the broader human culture (lol!)

If you wont join my religion, mint pithy proverbs explaining why power-over is so last species. And roll with that big smack upside the head that natural consequences are delivering to power-over/controlling culture, a.k.a survive.

[23]

And now a brief word from our sponsors:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... igion.html
Was God's wife edited out of the Bible? Atheist claims the Almighty had partner known as Asherah

A leading academic has claimed that God has a wife who was edited out of the Bible.

Atheist Dr Francesca Stavrakopoulou says that the Almighty, known as Yahweh, had a partner called Asherah who was worshipped.

The scholar's controversial claims are being explored in BBC2 series The Bible’s Buried Secrets.

His wife was presented as a deity in Israel and someone who sat alongside him, according to journal articles and books by the scholar.

Dr Francesca Stavrakopoulou, who has been given a primetime BBC slot, also claims that Eve has been ‘unfairly maligned’ by ‘middle-aged bearded men’ and should not have been blamed for the Fall of Man.

But some may raise eyebrows among viewers – including her suggestion that Eve was not the first woman in the Bible because the Garden of Eden did not belong in the original Old Testament.

The University of Exeter lecturer told Radio Times: ‘Eve, particularly in the Christian tradition, has been very unfairly maligned as the troublesome wife.’

But former MP Ann Widdecombe, who is a Roman Catholic, said: ‘I would guess that most other theologians will demolish her theory in three seconds flat.’

Dr Stavrakopoulou, who has a doctorate in theology from the University of Oxford, has confirmed she does not believe in God.

She said: ‘I’m an atheist with a huge respect for religion. I see what I do as a branch of history like any other.’

Dr Stavrakopoulou's claims that God had a wife appeared to be backed up by her own research into the subject.

More...

* Virgin Mary in a Lancashire sandpit? Construction engineers stumble across 'remarkable' Google Earth image

In a recent article she wrote: 'Archaeological evidence including inscriptions, figurines and ancient texts as well as details in the Bible, indicate not just that he was one of several worshipped in ancient Israel, but that he was also coupled with a goddess. She was worshipped alongside him in his temple in Jerusalem.

'I spent several years specialising in the cultural and social contexts of the Bible and I discovered that Yahweh, the God we have come to know, had to see off a number of competitors to achieve his position as the one and only god of the ancient Israelites.'

'The biblical texts name many of them: El, Baal, Molek, Asherah. Despite Yahweh's assertion in the Ten Commandments that "You shall have no other gods before me", it appears these gods were worshipped alongside Him, and the Bible acknowledges this.'



'Far more significant is the Bible's admission that the goddess Asherah was worshipped in Yahweh's temple in Jerusalem. In the Book Of Kings, we're told that a statue of Asherah was housed in the temple and that female temple personnel wove ritual textiles for her.

'In fact, although the Bible condemns all of these practices, the biblical texts suggest that goddess worship was a thriving feature of high-status religion in Jerusalem. What, then, was her relationship to Yahweh?

'Ancient texts, amulets and figurines unearthed here reveal that she was a powerful fertility goddess.

''But perhaps most significant of all, Asherah was also the wife of El, the high god at Ugarit - a god who shares much in common with Yahweh. Given the evidence within the Bible that she was worshipped in the temple in Jerusalem, might she have played the role of a divine wife in ancient Israel too?'

[charlie meadows]

And now a brief word from our sponsors:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... igion.html
Was God's wife edited out of the Bible? Atheist claims the Almighty had partner known as Asherah

ASHERAH
ASTARTE
ISHTAR
ASHTART
ASHTORETH
ASTORETH
ASHET
ASET
TANIT-ASHTART
ASHTAROTH

Is there a pattern here?

You just can't keep a good goddess down.

[Searcher08]

You illustrate what Im saying perfectly by your response. You simply refuse to acknowledge that a different perspective than your own doesnt imply some sort of attack on you personally. What you are speaking is not landing with me as sharing your experience or feelings, rather just a load of indignant self-righteous judgement.

That's because you've ignoring my experience in the first place. I'm going to back up because you're going in circles here and this is basically nonsensical at this point.

PW said:
I would no more wish to engage in a lengthy debate with someone who hated women than I would volunteer to marry a man who beat me every day. I'm sorry that doesn't make sense to you.

Searcher08 said:
No, it does make sense to me, I just really really disagree with you and that seems to drive you crazy. To me , you seem to only find value in people who share your ideology.

Right there, you don't get to disagree with me about decisions I make for my safety, you can give me advice, maybe, but otherwise you don't get to criticize choices I make that involve my psychological health and physical safety.

Two different points:
1 MY UNDERSTANDING:
You are communicating to me that you think you have some authority about whether another person criticises you or not. Who says? Where did you get the authority to tell another person what they can fucking THINK ABOUT??? THIS is fascist thinking in MY world.
2 You think that I have an opinion or other on safety issues for yourself. I have none. I have no interest or business in giving you or any person advise about anything unless asked. I have expressed no opinion about your choices - I dont even KNOW what choices you are referring to in your cloud-word filled communication.





Again, when I say I don't want to marry a man who beats me I'm not espousing an ideology, I'm speaking for myself, and you have no right to suggest I should marry a man who beats me because that fits in with your ideology. That's just disrespectful, not to mention cruel. You're ignoring the abuse and pain part and yeah, I find that upsetting.

Where on Earth am I suggesting you marry a man who beats you??????!!!!!!
I never said or implied any such thing!!! Im feeling amazed that you think that! Seriously, talk about projection - I find violence detestible - did you not read what Ive written about growing up in Belfast?

What's with the "are you still beating your wife" questions?

See above, that's how you come across to me.

????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You didnt address anything I actually said AFAICS.
I dont understand what is meant by "Im a man I can speak to Steven all I want"
How in particular doing speaking to Steven connect with my being male?

Right back at you. My understanding is the context of our discussion here is your complaint that Stephen is gone.


ORLY? My context for this discussion is that you appear intent on imposing a self-righteous rule based thought restriction on the one hand and you are making up shit about what Im saying on the other.

Where did I say you ESPOUSED creating a cognitive monoculture??
I'm saying that my perception is that is what you are DOING.

I don't have the power to create any kind of culture here.

NO SALE
Yes you do and IMHO you are.



I have strong opinions and I'm not ashamed of them, but I'm one of hundreds of posters here. If you're going to make an accusation like then provide specific examples, otherwise it's just another ad hominen.

See your exchanges on this thread.

I dont require you to speak to anyone. I dont require YOU to tell me what ideology to follow.
It's like someone saying
"You can only fight poverty if you follow our flag" Err...no. I'll follow it MY way.
"Then you hate our flag and us and must be a capitalist robber barro" Err.. no

I never said anything like that. I haven't advocated one way or another of combating misogyny. I've stated that various male posters here are being misogynistic and are not listening to or respecting women, and I've complained about one poster in particular whose speech I found crossed the line into hatred/abuse. This is not an ideology, these are my thoughts, feelings, opinions as a woman.


If you think you are not being listened to, respectfully, try looking at what is showing up in the world around you regarding feedback about your listening - in this thread.
You land with me as someone who wants to control what people think. You have described yourself as a hard core feminist and a proud feminazi (when I posted the definition of that from urbandictionary, you didn't disagree - 'someone waging a gender war against men'.) Our conflict would appear to come down to that.

The point Im making is a structural one. Im making the point that deciding not to talk with people who you either dislike intensely, personally loathe or whose values you detest is fine, or who dont do what you want, the way you want it, that's your decision, but if you imagine it doesn't have wider consequences in the system outside your own subjective experience, I suggest you are acting like Canute.

I did respond to your point as a structural one, and again here, you're ignoring the abuse part. It's not about dislike, or loathing, or detesting it's about self protection. In my example I said I wouldn't volunteer to debate men who hate women not men whom I hate. It's about the right to protect myself from psychological and perhaps even physical harm. The fact that you would strip that right from me, or forget that harm is a component in all this, no matter how often I've mentioned it, is disturbing.


I feel really disturbed by your language, which talks about "me stripping you" Forget harm? after being a carer for years? Seriously, WTF??

The next thing you say "placing in a role with no right to claim" - you dont specify the role, you dont specify how Im apparently claiming it and you dont specify how these rights get established; for sorry, I dont understand what you are even saying in that sentence.

See above. You said: Im making the point that deciding not to talk with people who you... I have the right to decide not to talk with them because it causes me harm to talk to them. I assert that you're not in a position to argue against me making a choice on that basis.

You are again CONFLATING TWO THINGS
I KNOW you have the right to talk to who you want, when you want about what you want, how you want.

1 How you spend the resources of YOUR time and attention and thinking focus is YOURS ALONE to determine.
Not me, not some bloke, not c2w, not JR, not the CIA, not Bart Simpson , not Marge, not Borat - NO-ONE!!! Just YOU!!!!

2 How IIIII spend the resources of MYYYY time and attention and thinking focus is MINE ALONE to determine.
YOU have NO RIGHT to tell me about what IIII choose to think about or to ARGUE about. NONE NADA ZERO.

Please, tell me this penny is going to drop soon, because I'm getting tired.

I think that last line is known technically as "grandstanding" .

Well, its always good to try to communicate. Its always good to recognise when there is hopefully temporary failure. My interaction with you has been characterised, from my point of view, by you saying things I didnt say, ignoring things I did, being offended over invented slights, quick to anger and slow to understand, being a model for patronising, having you attempt to proscribe my thinking and communication, attempting power plays, along with assertions about me 'removing your power' (WTF?!!) then finishing with a grandstanding flourish.

Perhaps we should leave it there for the moment!

[Searcher08]

You just can't keep a good goddess down.

That is such a great saying!

[Project Willow]

Cool, Willow. But men who are not misogynists also post here too, as men complete with lives lived as men and probably all have perfectly fine relationships with any number of women in their real lives. Nobody is "stripping" anything from you. Nobody, well at least myself, is ignoring you. Nobody is here to abuse or to foment abuse of women.

I disagree with you, and if that were true, we wouldn't have the new rule in place. Besides 82, that statement was not addressed to you or to others in general, it was addressed to Searcher08 and is very specific to our exchange.

OTOH this statement applies to you:

PW wrote:
I've stated that various male posters here are being misogynistic and are not listening to or respecting women,

It's obvious you disagree with me about your own behavior, and it's been obvious from the start.

I also don't agree with your "we can all be friends" sentiments but we've had that argument before.

[82_28]

And now a brief word from our sponsors:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... igion.html
Was God's wife edited out of the Bible? Atheist claims the Almighty had partner known as Asherah

ASHERAH
ASTARTE
ISHTAR
ASHTART
ASHTORETH
ASTORETH
ASHET
ASET
TANIT-ASHTART
ASHTAROTH

Is there a pattern here?

You just can't keep a good goddess down.

No, no you can't. My NYtimes username is "asherah2" and when I was a youngun' myself and some friends started a film production company named "Asherah Productions". As some can see, I've been deeply involved in the misogyny movement for a long time.

[82_28]

Cool, Willow. But men who are not misogynists also post here too, as men complete with lives lived as men and probably all have perfectly fine relationships with any number of women in their real lives. Nobody is "stripping" anything from you. Nobody, well at least myself, is ignoring you. Nobody is here to abuse or to foment abuse of women.

I disagree with you, and if that were true, we wouldn't have the new rule in place. Besides 82, that statement was not addressed to you or to others in general, it was addressed to Searcher08 and is very specific to our exchange.

OTOH this statement applies to you:

PW wrote:
I've stated that various male posters here are being misogynistic and are not listening to or respecting women,

It's obvious you disagree with me about your own behavior, and it's been obvious from the start.

I also don't agree with your "we can all be friends" sentiments but we've had that argument before.

We had no such "argument". We've met in person, Willow and I thought, had a great time. You know that even by being a guy, I am also nice and am out to do no harm -- as a man speaking, I always seek to do the opposite of harm. If it's that we discussed things here on RI or the time we met and that's what you're calling an "argument" then fine -- call it as you will. However, yes, yes we all can have differences and still be friends.

[Project Willow]

PW said:
I would no more wish to engage in a lengthy debate with someone who hated women than I would volunteer to marry a man who beat me every day. I'm sorry that doesn't make sense to you.

Searcher08 said:
No, it does make sense to me, I just really really disagree with you and that seems to drive you crazy. To me , you seem to only find value in people who share your ideology.

Right there, you don't get to disagree with me about decisions I make for my safety, you can give me advice, maybe, but otherwise you don't get to criticize choices I make that involve my psychological health and physical safety.

Two different points:
1 MY UNDERSTANDING:
You are communicating to me that you think you have some authority about whether another person criticises you or not. Who says? Where did you get the authority to tell another person what they can fucking THINK ABOUT??? THIS is fascist thinking in MY world.

No, you're stripping the qualifier, and therefore unfairly misinterpreting my point. This is what I said: but otherwise you don't get to criticize choices I make that involve my psychological health and physical safety.

2 You think that I have an opinion or other on safety issues for yourself. I have none. I have no interest or business in giving you or any person advise about anything unless asked. I have expressed no opinion about your choices - I dont even KNOW what choices you are referring to in your cloud-word filled communication.

The cloud is clearly over your own comprehension. Again my choice that you're disagreeing with, of not speaking with men who hate women, INHERENTLY involves decisions about my safety, ineherently, the two are not separable.

Where on Earth am I suggesting you marry a man who beats you??????!!!!!!
I never said or implied any such thing!!! Im feeling amazed that you think that! Seriously, talk about projection - I find violence detestible - did you not read what Ive written about growing up in Belfast?

It's quite plain and clear. You disagreed with me when I said this: I would no more wish to engage in a lengthy debate with someone who hated women than I would volunteer to marry a man who beat me every day. That's a comparative statement. I'm saying the two for me are roughly equivalent in that I experience the hate speech from a man who hates women as a form of violence, it causes me psychological harm. I'm saying that in disagreeing with that statement you are denying that I have a right to avoid harm. If you don't mean what you say, then don't say it.

I don't have the power to create any kind of culture here.

NO SALE
Yes you do and IMHO you are.

Wow! Cool, Project Willow almighty! Bow before me. Muahahahahah!

You land with me as someone who wants to control what people think. You have described yourself as a hard core feminist and a proud feminazi (when I posted the definition of that from urbandictionary, you didn't disagree - 'someone waging a gender war against men'.) Our conflict would appear to come down to that.

That was a joke, that you accepted it as a straight statement, and are obviously completely unaware of its origins is telling. Using that word puts you in company with Rush Limbaugh and other far right reactionaries.

You are again CONFLATING TWO THINGS

I am not conflating, I am telling you straight out, the issue of whom to talk to in this specific case, for me personally and experiencing harm are inseparable. Therefore it's not up for debate.

I KNOW you have the right to talk to who you want, when you want about what you want, how you want.

1 How you spend the resources of YOUR time and attention and thinking focus is YOURS ALONE to determine.
Not me, not some bloke, not c2w, not JR, not the CIA, not Bart Simpson , not Marge, not Borat - NO-ONE!!! Just YOU!!!!

2 How IIIII spend the resources of MYYYY time and attention and thinking focus is MINE ALONE to determine.
YOU have NO RIGHT to tell me about what IIII choose to think about or to ARGUE about. NONE NADA ZERO.

As for #2, again, you don't have the right to argue with me over the choices I make about whom to talk to when those choices involve me protecting my safety, that's stepping over a boundary. Otherwise, we agree here.

I also agree that we're quite at an impasse in terms of communication, and of course I completely disagree with your reading of, well, basically everything.

[Searcher08]

I also agree that we're quite at an impasse in terms of communication, and of course I completely disagree with your reading of, well, basically everything.

What do your boundaries have to do with my attention?? My attention is for me to direct where / how I choose
As is YOURS.

Are you saying "I, PW, have the right to argue with Searcher about anything I damn well want"
AND "Searcher does NOT have the right to argue with me about my safety choices"

I also agree that we're quite at an impasse in terms of communication, and I also completely disagree with your reading of, well, basically everything too.

so, we appear to be....err... in complete agreement about something.

[Project Willow]

Are you saying "I, PW, have the right to argue with Searcher about anything I damn well want"

Nope.

AND "Searcher does NOT have the right to argue with me about my safety choices"

Yes.

[Searcher08]

Are you saying "I, PW, have the right to argue with Searcher about anything I damn well want"

Nope.

AND "Searcher does NOT have the right to argue with me about my safety choices"

Yes.

Well, that seems to have narrowed the focus of the major disagreement between us.

I, Searcher, have NO authority / power / over what you, Willow choose to communicate / engage with another person about.
I, Searcher, cannot be - and refuse to be - given a power that is not mine to receive, one that is YOURS.

You, Willow, have NO authority / power / over what I, Searcher choose to communicate / engage with another about.
You, Willow, cannot take - and I refuse to give you, a power that is not yours to claim, one that is MINE.

and my understanding is that your position is the converse of each of those four statements

[Searcher08]

PW said:
I would no more wish to engage in a lengthy debate with someone who hated women than I would volunteer to marry a man who beat me every day. I'm sorry that doesn't make sense to you.

Searcher08 said:
No, it does make sense to me, I just really really disagree with you and that seems to drive you crazy. To me , you seem to only find value in people who share your ideology.

Right there, you don't get to disagree with me about decisions I make for my safety, you can give me advice, maybe, but otherwise you don't get to criticize choices I make that involve my psychological health and physical safety.

Two different points:
1 MY UNDERSTANDING:
You are communicating to me that you think you have some authority about whether another person criticises you or not. Who says? Where did you get the authority to tell another person what they can fucking THINK ABOUT??? THIS is fascist thinking in MY world.

No, you're stripping the qualifier, and therefore unfairly misinterpreting my point. This is what I said: but otherwise you don't get to criticize choices I make that involve my psychological health and physical safety.


You always evade my question about this.

2 You think that I have an opinion or other on safety issues for yourself. I have none. I have no interest or business in giving you or any person advise about anything unless asked. I have expressed no opinion about your choices - I dont even KNOW what choices you are referring to in your cloud-word filled communication.

The cloud is clearly over your own comprehension. Again my choice that you're disagreeing with, of not speaking with men who hate women, INHERENTLY involves decisions about my safety, ineherently, the two are not separable.



You can choose to speak or not speak to whoever the heck you want. However, NOT speaking with people has wider consequences systemically than you yourself. You appear incapable of seeing this.

Where on Earth am I suggesting you marry a man who beats you??????!!!!!!
I never said or implied any such thing!!! Im feeling amazed that you think that! Seriously, talk about projection - I find violence detestible - did you not read what Ive written about growing up in Belfast?

It's quite plain and clear. You disagreed with me when I said this: I would no more wish to engage in a lengthy debate with someone who hated women than I would volunteer to marry a man who beat me every day. That's a comparative statement. I'm saying the two for me are roughly equivalent in that I experience the hate speech from a man who hates women as a form of violence, it causes me psychological harm. I'm saying that in disagreeing with that statement you are denying that I have a right to avoid harm. If you don't mean what you say, then don't say it.


You didnt answer my question.
If you are making a comparison between those two things being the same, that appears to be to be more evidence for my point that you are a subjectivist - who is saying that because you feel something internally that that has the same validity as an external fact like the law of gravity. They are not the same. You are now blending it in with a (very valid) need , which is to avoid harm. Subjective experience does not follow the same structure as objective as a person who thinks they can fly under LSD soon finds out.

I have never and would never deny a person their need for safety. Nor would I deny the subjective reality that person was experiencing as being powerfully present for them.

I don't have the power to create any kind of culture here.

NO SALE
Yes you do and IMHO you are.

Wow! Cool, Project Willow almighty! Bow before me. Muahahahahah!




I'm reading you being ironic as a play on you not having power. I dont experience you as powerless.

You land with me as someone who wants to control what people think. You have described yourself as a hard core feminist and a proud feminazi (when I posted the definition of that from urbandictionary, you didn't disagree - 'someone waging a gender war against men'.) Our conflict would appear to come down to that.

That was a joke, that you accepted it as a straight statement, and are obviously completely unaware of its origins is telling. Using that word puts you in company with Rush Limbaugh and other far right reactionaries.




Argumentation FAIL
Now THAT is funny - if I dont "get" your humour, I become Rush Limbaugh. Obviously. Completely.
I gave you a commonly accepted definition - and a source. You didnt comment.

You are again CONFLATING TWO THINGS

I am not conflating, I am telling you straight out, the issue of whom to talk to in this specific case, for me personally and experiencing harm are inseparable. Therefore it's not up for debate.




You are using harm in two different senses - one an internal subjective experience realm one, the other an external objective experience one. If you DONT have these as separate, then I can see what you say perfectly.

For me, you seem to have no empathy whatsoever for my sense of autonomy and seen to think it's ok to limit where and how a person directs their attention but if you have a criterial equivalence between conversational areas and actual harm, I can see that and that you have probably experienced large parts of this interaction as a physical threat to your wellbeing. For which I genuinely hope you didnt.

You have a choice about whether you want to enter into any form of discussion. You are not required or compelled to enter into any communication with me or anyone else. If you dont want to speak about it, that is your management of your attention. If you dont want to speak about something, what do you think Im gonna do?
I dont put attention into communication with people who dont want to communicate beyond a certain point.

I guess that is it in a nutshell - to me you blur the line between internal feelings and physicality. For me they are two distinct, unique worlds as is the third world, that of concepts and ideas. This is where IMHO boundaries are really important - to know what is a feeling, what is beach ball and what is an idea.

For me feelings are never to be neglected, but as the forum says, have rigourous intuition.

[Kate]

Wintler, hi again!

There are two things you mentioned that I'd like to pick up on...

I see it as simply selfinterest - judging others as less deserving/right than myself makes it easier to speak for/dehumanise/control them, especially if you can get a few other selfinterested individuals to go along.

in light of what you had mentioned just before that:

I have a premonition that natural selection is going to be the real convincer

(highlighting/emphasis added)

My impression, correct me if I'm wrong, as that at least at the moment, you see the two things -- self interest, on the one hand versus this,

sermon on the mount, lao tsu, even the desiderata covers some of this ground. They're maybe not what you had in mind, but we need to think big,

,

on the other hand.

My belief is that not only are the two NOT mutually exclusive, but that the REAL self-interest is in "power (from) within," and NOT "power over."

I recognize that this is an article of faith on my part, not something I can prove in any empirical manner. But I've believed this for a very, VERY long time (at least since I was twelve). [And I'm reluctant to publicly admit just HOW LONG a time ago that was. ]

But I remember the day, freshman year in high school, when I took part in a classroom debate. The class was given by a priest (Jesuit, even though my school was diocesan, i.e., not a specific "order"] who had once worked in the U.S. State Department, before leaving to enter the seminary. The class was "US-Sino-Soviet Relations" coving some of the most recent "hot" years of the cold war. We had books which explained (relatively neutrally, imagine that!) concepts like "proxy war," and imperialism, colonialism, geopolitical "strategy," exploitation of natural resources, etc. etc.

[I lucked out, in that geographically speaking I ended up in an unusual school where the priests and nuns (as well as the majority secular teachers) gave us required reading (in required courses), like Eldridge Cleaver, Autobiography of Malcom X, Maya Angelou ("I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings), "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee," -- and our class trips would be things like going to DC to participate in a "Vietnam War Moritorium" or to see "The Trial of the Catonsville Nine" (and meeting Daniel and Phil Berrigan). This is just to let you know that I eventually came to realize that this was NOT the typical "Catholic high school experience" of the era!]

I found myself on my feet in class, debating with someone else who essentially said, "Why the hell should we care about 'THOSE PEOPLE' on the other side of the globe? What do they have to do with ME/US?!?"

I'm certain I was relatively incoherent, but what I was struggling so hard to say was that their "self-interest" is ALSO "my/our self-interest." I didn't know the word, "blow-back," although I was getting at that and something MORE. Something like MLK's "An injustice to one is an injustice to all."

From the time I understood some concepts of evolution (encouraged by teachers who never saw evolution as something "anti-spiritual"). I believed that humanity is evolving toward a "put up or shut up," "now or never" instance of learning to cooperate and value the dignity of all/each -- and if we DON'T, we will commit mass suicide, in whatever form (fire, ice, "other") it will take. That we approaching something inevitable. And (for me, in my heart) failure is NOT acceptable. Not that I can control anyone else's behavior. But I can control mine. Oddly, in the face of all the ugliness (and I do look and see just how ugly the ugliness is) I still believe the same thing I did then. I guess I just still believe that there IS something "true" about the nature of the "human being," and that it's to develop into the "power within" person (EACH one, with dignity) and away from the "power over" sickness.

And for me, misogyny is ONE "brand" of that same, death-bringing sickness.

Having said all this, I'm betting you would guess rightly about my reaction when a teacher gave me a Pierre Teilhard de Chardin book to read (Hymn of the Universe).

And, as I said, I know this is "faith," but it's not really "Christian" -- I couldn't care less what religious faith one ascribes to, or NONE at all; what counts for me is the faith in "power within" and leaving behind in the sad, cruel dustbin of history any sort of "power over."

[My mistake in my youth was in believing that the values imparted to me by my Catholic high school teachers was the set of values held by the whole "Church."

And then I woke up. And discovered that not everyone loved Thomas Merton and Dorothy Day and Oscar Romero, for example. But that is a whole 'nother story, irrelevant here.]

It is strange, though, that my feminism was born through the "midwifery" of those "radical" Catholics who defied the bishop to invite me to serve at the altar, and who told me it was inevitable that women would be ordained, or else the "Church" would die. (And I believe they're STILL right about that. The "Church" is already dead, the walking dead.)

[Kate]

Jeez, Louise!!!

Wintler -- I THOUGHT I HIT "PREVIEW" -- but hit "Submit," obviously.

The part where I quoted you? I was trying to say it was my impression you see "natural selection" and "abandoning 'power over'" as mutually exclusive.

Sheesh. Sorry I muddled that up!!!