Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
Sometimes an idea hits me leading to an epiphany. Epiphanies for me usually take the shape of the realization that a 
belief I’ve held for a long time, is actually more important in the scheme of things than I had previously thought about. This happened with me some few years ago when the opposition to gay marriage defeated a voter initiative. I had been a believer in the need for equality for Gay men and women since I was a teenager. After all the bullies who were beating me up kept calling me a “fag, or “queer” and while I wasn’t, I got insight into what it must be like to be homosexual. In life you have the choice of identifying with the bully, or those who are bullied. I’ve always chosen the latter. So as a young adult I cried tears of joy when “Stonewall” happened and the police found that Gays would no longer be easy targets. Working for NYC’s Human Rights Administration and then living in Manhattan gave me the privilege of meeting and befriending Gay people of both sexes. When AIDS hit the scene I had many friends die and I worked to help the Division of Aids Services as a Budget Director. Yet while I always completely supported LGBT rights, for a while I believed the focus on Gay Marriage, shouldn’t be in the forefront of the movement. The argument over Proposition 8 in California http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposition_8 gave me an epiphany that led me to see that not only was the right to marriage an essential part of ensuring the Constitutional Rights of Gay people, but it was the key element. Being unable to assist in the health care choices of long term partners, in some cases even being barred from the funerals, or participating in ones’ partners Health Plan are important Constitutional issues and the essence of the battle.
Last night my wife and I saw and were very moved by Stephen Spielberg’s “Lincoln”. There was a scene in it during a congressional debate where one congressman said in effect “If we grant Blacks freedom, then we’ll have to give them the right to vote……and if we give them the right to vote we will have to give women the right to vote. In truth it was another six decades before this country bestowed upon its’ women the basic Constitutional Right of voting as my wife pointed out to me. Later in the evening we watched the Bill Maher Show and during the discussion reference was made to the frequency of abuse and murder of women throughout the world and suddenly my epiphany. While I’ve always supported women’s rights, it is so easy in a world where so many wrong things occur daily to not place the abuse and murder of women particularly at the top of an agenda decrying unjust war, drone attacks, racism, economic disparity and torture, to name a few. As it became clear to me last night, the murder, rape, bondage and the degradation of women is part and parcel of all these issues of evil and not merely one aspect of them. Considering that women comprise at least half of humanity, the mistreatment of women worldwide is actually the most important issue humanity faces. We must solve this before we can even hope to solve any other great issue. Because I’m not really a great thinker, many of my “epiphanies” are ones that are obvious to many. However, when they do occur I am willing to reconsider the hierarchy of my beliefs. Unlike my other guest blogs I will not tire you with the evidence of what to me is self-evident. Do you agree, or do you have other world problem solving priorities?
Mike,
In your picture quilt, you forgot to include the woman that, IMHO, stood head and shoulder above some you did include. Florence Nightingale.
Here is a portrait of the young nurse before she went off to Crimea:
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01292/florence_nightinga_1292489c.jpg
This is her portrait after the Crimean War.
http://media.web.britannica.com/eb-media/06/82506-004-C127D364.jpg
That is what PTSD looks like, for those who don’t already know.
She was my wife’s hero, and certainly one of mine. We still have the Florence Nightingale lamp my wife was given when she graduated from nursing school. It will be going to my Daughter-in-Law who loved and respected Mama, and is a critical care ICU nurse herself. The family tradition carries on. Wonderful and powerful women. I love nurses, and not just because my mom was one and I married one.
I retire, if I keep babbling no one stays around. Bye bye.
Besidess -S_G, your examples just show that any creature can be warped by it’s surroundings. Survival IS the prime motivator, and then procreation.
S_G,
Oh yeah, they imitate us too. Look at Diane Feinstein. I bet she has a big one (clitoris?)
Dredd 1
David 1
Jeez, what a team we have here. Humbled, I quieten.
Women can be, have been and are as oppressive as any man in their particular cultural group or society. Women owned and brutalized slaves, assisted in death camps and lynchings, inspired and participated in colonialism and imperialism, help enforce genital mutilations, etc. Misogyny is just a particular form of the human need to define the “other” as less than. It depends on where you stand on whether you feel it is THE critical issue. I don’t see it that way.
“As it became clear to me last night, the murder, rape, bondage and the degradation of women is part and parcel of all these issues of evil and not merely one aspect of them.”
The blatant subjugation, and second class status of women, historically and currently is all you say it is. Thank you, Mike Spindell.
I think your epiphany though should be squared, (in a math sense)
The historical subjugation of women is a sick perverse “bonding” of Caveman ritual….. In this instance I mean men & men only.
This caveman bonding reaches across religion, social status, politics, and oceans. The “locker room” talk of adolescent boys must be universal. I don’t know this, but believe it to be true. (any studies?).
The locker room talk of adolescent boys becomes winks and nods in boardrooms, macho talk in army barracks, a definition of male vitality and value across the spectrum of caveman communication.
Men in general ignore and accept the subjugation of women,
Men bond together by lessening womens value.
It’s the caveman “we got swingy thingys and you don’t club”.
In a past comment I parodied an Adam and Eve story.
God asked Eve if she wanted a swingy thingy, with the stipulation it comes with a very small yet independent brain. ” God No” Eve replied, I want to go through life using my big brain”.
Viva la difference,…. but too often la difference is used to subjugate the Viva of the female gender.
We males may think we are far out of our caves, but I suggest many or most of us still carry the rocks of our ancestors ….. in our heads!!! :o).
“Unlike my other guest blogs I will not tire you with the evidence of what to me is self-evident. Do you agree, or do you have other world problem solving priorities?” – Mike S
The senator you paraphrased said in effect:
It is another way of saying all human rights are equally important, sacrosanct, and somehow linked together.
The gist of it is that societies fail on particular human rights according to their development level, their social evolutionary location, at any given time.
The same with propaganda.
As it fails human rights bloom.
The fundamental right that makes all the rest possible is the freedom from propaganda.
We are so far from that reality it makes all the other human rights face jeopardy decade after decade.
As your other post pointed out, and many commentators on that thread missed, war is the steroids for propaganda and vice versa.
They feed one another with toxins that do heart, brain, and soul damage, which they choose to call honor.
One warped world view I see in the news is rejoicing when we give women the right to commit war crimes along with the boyz, but does not rejoice when they can vote and make their own health and procreation decisions.
Quote for the day: “Where there is propaganda, there is bullying.”
Darren Smith,
I needed a day to comment your latest.
Your plea is well plead, And balm as a distraction from the ills which some hear daily. (Not all have ears).
But isn’t it just that, an open declaration for internal use that WE can’t do anything about what happens in Saudi Arabia, and can cluckcluck and move on to our daily life.
Please do explain how the miseries of women in SA can energize us here to help them in a concrete and effort requiring move from us as individuals. NOT snark in spite of the formulation. A real question. I am not here to score points.
Letters to Congress don’t count. 🙂
I agree with the views of Malisha, Rachel and Kathleen most particularly. I see women as the main human rights issue because women represent 50% or more of humanity and so represent the greatest number of oppressed. Also, as the women above ably pointed out I (or they) csn feel the way we do and still continue to fight the other oppressions that exist in this world.
Also responding to some good comments I do agree that oppression of women exists to a lesser degree in what we call the “Western World”. Yet as we saw in whst crawled out of the woodwork in this last election, there are those who would institue a Christian version of sharia law here. Also given unequal pay and other systemic handicaps most women in the U.S. suffer some oppression.
I wish Mike hadn’t posted a picture of Mother Teresa on this topic. She was NOT a compassionate, caring woman. Rather, she belongs along with the post on Petraeus….a woman with extraordinary PR.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/fighting_words/2003/10/mommie_dearest.html
Working Man,
I thought about the Mother Teresa thing before deciding on that photo montage. The montage represents the entirety of womanhood and even includes the perhaps 30,000 year old totem representing the Goddess known as “The Great Mother”. There are many, including myself who believe that the “Original God” was The Great Mother and most of humanity back then lived in matriarchy. Then the more powerful sex physically (not mentally in my opinion) revolted, instituted a Patriarchy and have screwed things up ever since. That’s only slightly tongue in cheek. 🙂
Mike, good topic
Darren, thanks for your clarification.
Malisha, bingo!
Mike S, thank you for this article.
For ages I have been saying that all the hatreds stem from misogyny. Racism, aggressive nationalism, bigotry of all kinds, hatred against people practicing a different religion, against the poor, against those who look different, against indigenous peoples, etc. etc. I maintain they are all the branches of the tree that grows from the root of misogyny.
Because the women bear children. Because it is natural for women to automatically and instinctively love and protect their children. Mess with that and you mess with absolutely everything. Support that and you support all the right things and automatically move rather quickly in the right direction.
I believe the hatred itself is about deprivation. The most fierce and insoluble deprivation — the kind that results from mistreating mothers so that they cannot and then do not nurture their children in a nurturing world. Whole thing stinks.
And I doubt there is a way to turn it around now. It is the very basis of patriarchy.
rafflaw wrote:
Darren,
Gay women are not universally allowed to marry whomever they want.
~+~
I stand corrected. You are right.
I think that what you said is very powerful and very true in many ways. I see something else though in my travels and observations. Many espouse the idea of educating women and empowering them. I think one of the best things one can do for women is to educate men. The more freely and comprehensively that men are educated, the better they are to women. women are treated the worst in places where men are the least empowered or very disadvantaged also. The worse off that they are educationally, you can probably bet that the women are that much more so. Those with the least power in their world are the ones that culturally, feel the need to exert it in the home or to those weaker than they are. Weakness is the food of bullies, and when men are educated, they value it in their women. I saw it in the middle east and noticed that certain cultural traditions were more easily overcome among groups of society where the men had better education and opportunity. I think that in the rush to protect women, we forget that they are the mothers of the boys who are abusing and part of the society that itself propagates unacceptable behavior to other women. The problem with men is that they already have the socially superior position-they are the ones that need to have the social awareness and to be able to recognize the value of women beyond that of a homemaker and mother-even if their wives are never in the work force, education instills respect for others. Just my .02 worth. Protecting women can’t happen with PR campaigns or laws alone. Education is what will change the attitudes of men and societal norms.
Mike,
Great post. The West is clearly ahead of the curve on women’s rights. The good o’l USA is somewhat progressive. It was however only 4 years ago that Obama signed the Lily Ledbetter Act. The conservative men on the court very recently were willing to insist that women be economically discriminated against. This should remind us that we have a ways to go. A lot more “epiphanies” will be needed before we as a culture get equality for women.
I have always felt that my passionate advocacy is part and parcel of my strong feminist beliefs. Women were enslaved and abused before the white settlers started importing African slaves. They were the first “oppressed minority” and they will probably be the last. While other minorities in this country continue to make strides towards equality, women’s rights are being plundered by religious extremists, “personhood” amendments and Congress itself. Human trafficking is rampant, and women are routinely brutalized, raped, murdered and enslaved not just in Third World countries but right here in the US.
Does this mean that I am not passionate about other causes? Of course not. I just believe that my passion is informed by the fact that I am a woman and because of that one accident of biology I know first hand what it means to be “oppressed.”
Darren,
Gay women are not universally allowed to marry whomever they want. I understand your point, but women in the US are not treated and dealt with as equally as men in the US. As you suggest, the international problems with equality for women are not slighted by a discussion that women here are not equal.
Anon: some ARE more important than others, because some cause more suffering than others. Isn’t literal slavery (as laborers or sex workers) worse than not being allowed to marry?
That doesn’t mean the slaves are more important than the homosexuals, it means the slaves are suffering more, and with some limited amount of energy, budget, time or votes the plight of the slaves should be prioritized over the plight of the gays.
Equal pay for equal work is certainly something I support, but I would donate and switch my vote to somebody that did NOT support that if I thought their promises to crack down on sexual slavery were real.
Most important human rights issue – women – I don’t think so. Nor do I think it’s any specific minoriy, or gays, or children, or the handicapped, etc.
To say that one groups human rights is more important an issue than another’s is like saying I’m more important than you. What a naive statement. If you concentrate on one groups human rights the rest seem unimportant and no groups human rights should ever be less important than another.
Human rights are for all…that’s why it’s called human rights.