Circe is a Big Multi-Syllabled Meanie

I bet you all totally want to know what I'm doing on the various class discussion boards, right? 'Cause you're all getting my Soci/English degree right along with me here, right?

Cool.

It's been a hectic week. I'm involved in some semi-complicated legal issue that I'm not going to talk about until it's a done deal and I can drink 3-5 wine spritzers celebrate here with you all. This issue is taking up time I'd rather be spending sleeping watching tv drinking 3-5 wine spritzers on my studies. My discussion posts are kinda rough, kinda inflammatory ('cause who knew I had all these ANGER ISSUES?). But since I don't have time to do stuff like sleep watch the chickens shower blog actual entries, I thought I'd show you how I'm goofing around on my class discussion boards...

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Okay. This is from my Soci class. Here's the weekly discussion board assignment:

What does your
religion/spirituality/atheism/belief system teach you about women's roles?

Also,
respond to another thread of conversation.

As you can imagine, I hyperventilated, I was so excited! I even did my evil genius laugh.

Here's my offering:

"Violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism and tribalism and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive towards children..."(Hitchens, C. God is not Great p. 56)


All religions are bad, some are just worse than others. I do not personally subscribe to the notion that one should respect the religion of others. I avoid religious discussions because they seem to accomplish nothing, but I no more respect any religion than I respect a culture enforcing female genital mutilation.

I was raised Mormon and I like to say that all roads for any insightful, intelligent, open-minded Mormon woman end in the relief of atheism. My experience is that Mormonism, like all other major world religions, is rooted in misogyny, control and exploitation through the use of shame and guilt, coercion, discrimination, patriarchal domination, marginalization, emotional abuse, and moral terrorism.

I was taught that a woman is to subordinate herself to men; that only men can hold the priesthood and therefore to obey men is to obey God. The justification was the same old "separate but equal" excuse that our nation ultimately found so reprehensible during the Civil Rights Movement. I was taught that my role was to be gentle and meek, that my ultimate goal and reward was to be a good wife and mother. I was taught that education is good for women only because it would enable her as a mother to help her children in school. The Mormon prophet explicitly told us that it is better to die than to break the law of chastity. I was taught that my body was sinful, that sexual feelings came from Satan. We are presented with the Used Bubblegum Theory: Our bodies are bubblegum. If we allow ourselves to be used sexually, we become like used bubblegum and no righteous man will want to chew (marry) us.

I'm not bubblegum. I don't want to spend my life as some man's inferior "help meet." I don't want every avenue of healthy inquiry and curiosity to be condemned as evil. I don't want to be involved in anything that excommunicates a woman for self-identifying as a feminist. I don't want to be made ashamed for asking questions, for seeking answers and ultimate truth. I also do not believe these issues are exclusive to Mormonism but that they extend to almost every religion* as well as the climate of obligatory Christianity currently controlling our country.

I believe that our government is in blatant defiance of the very Constitutional principles our country was founded upon in its enforcement of Christianity upon an entire population. I believe that here in Texas, to speak out against this mandatory Christianity is to commit social and professional suicide. I believe that religion poisons everything and our world history is abundantly filled with examples.



* I am excluding women-oriented religions such as Neo Paganism and the practice of wiccanism.

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Blah blah blah, right? Not one of my better efforts and nothing I haven't said here a bunch of times.

Now here's someone's response to me:

Wow, It  seems like you have been mixed up into a meesed up doctrine. But you do have your opinion. And Sometimes I think that some people can get too wrapped up int man-made rules that they forget about what's important and that's to love each other. They would rather say son't do this and don't do that or you will burn in hell. But I think that regardless of your religion a good charactered woman  will still gain the respect of her husband. And if they are religious then they caould still live their lives according to the Word of God.

Huh? I was all, wtf? I have absolutely no idea what she's saying.

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And now here's the post that I responded to:

In my religion, which is Christianity, the role of the male is very dominant.  In the household the male is supposed to be the dominant person because it is his home.  He is supposed to be the "man of the house," as you would say.  This exactly the way it is at my house, but my parents are very equal in society.  My dad is the man of the house and has the final word to a decision that has to do with the house. 

In my religion I believe in Jesus and God and both of them are referred to has "he or him" in the bible.  This is one of the reasons that men get the power title.  So in studying the bible I do believe that the man should have more power about certain things, but I do think that a woman should stand on her own as well.

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(Hee! The "power title!" I want the "power title!")

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This is my response:

Religion's continuation depends directly upon the indoctrination of children. Part of the indoctrination of nearly all religions is the doctrine of women's inferiority to men. If religion teaches that because God is a man, man is superior to women, she will either accept and internalize this dogma or she will question and rebel. Religion is not known for its tolerance of rebellion.

Until 1978, Black men were banned from holding the priesthood within the Mormon Church. (For clarification, the priesthood is something every male member has bestowed upon him at age twelve and with this priesthood they are officially deemed superior to women.) The Church held many Black members and it taught these members that, in the words of Prophet Woodruff, "The Lord said I will not kill Cain, but I will put a mark upon him and it is seen in the face of every Negro on earth. And it is the degree of God that that mark shall remain upon the seed of Cain and the Curse until all the seed of Abel should be redeemed and Cain will not hold the priesthood until all the seed of Abel are redeemed. Any man having one drop of the seed of Cain in him cannot hold the Priesthood and if no other Prophet spake it before I will say it now in the name of Jesus Christ." (Journal of Wilford Woodruff 4:97)

Black Mormons could hold membership, but they were not allowed to hold the priesthood or partake of Temple ordinances. In other words, they were held to be inferior, less worthy, of substandard value. They were told that this was the will of God and Jesus, that God and Jesus were White men untouched by the mark of Cain, and that it was sanctified in the scripture that they as Blacks were a lesser people. And while you would think (or perhaps that's just me thinking...), that they would rebel, renounce this bias and bigotry, even mock any religion that insisted on this disparity of equality, this insult and injustice... they did not.

I liken this directly to women who accept that their religion places them as the inferior of their husband or of any man.

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So far, oddly enough, she hasn't responded back.