Apologies

On a grand scale, I don't understand why we have a society set up that is so mean to women. I guess I understand why it is, what I don't get is why it has to be that way. I've come to believe that men really hate, or at least, resent women - deep down, males have a jealousy developed before they were able to consciously understand the jealousy. Then, during adulthood, we begin to want to pass our genetic material on, and for women, it is easier to be sure we’re doing it. We can be 100% sure that our kids – the ones to which we give birth – have our genetic material. Men don’t have that luxury, and I’m terribly sorry about that, but I’m tired of being punished for it.

I’m so sorry that men will never get to give birth, I’m sorry that they feel like they don’t contribute to the reproductive process. What I don’t understand is why they can’t seem to get over it. Things developed in the unconscious mind and instinct to reproduce are hard to get over, I guess. But the extent to which men will go gets very ridiculous. When men finally realized their contribution in the form of sperm, some ignored the obvious similarities between offspring and their mothers and decided that ALL of the genetic material came from the men, and women were simply carriers. Freud even developed the idiotic concept of “penis envy”, ignoring the very obvious implications of society on gender roles.

Maybe this makes me a man-hater, but really, why shouldn’t I hate men? Give me a good reason to not hate the gender that has shown me nothing but their own insecurity, the needless oppression of my gender, and hatred for something I can’t help – my uterus. My hatred of one gender is based on how that gender treats me. Men’s hatred of women is precisely because of what our bodies can do. My response is this: get the fuck over yourselves. You’ll never be able to give birth or breastfeed. We don’t think less of you because of it. If we do think less of you, it is because you can't seem to get over it.

Please note that I hve decided not to use the term "sexist" and have instead decided to just use men. I don't yet have a big readership, and I highly doubt that I have any male readers, but I know that men tend to get defensive about this kind of thing. I don't see this post as anything other than some musings and statements of realities.

If, as a man, you feel the need to be defensive, remember that actions speak much louder than words. It is also a little pointless for you to feel defensive about something you can't help. I don't imagine that you can control your subconcious feelings of insecurity over the inability to be 100% sure that you've passed on your genetic material. I do expect you to be able to understand these feelings and control your behavior. This is called maturity.

Sub-concious Inferiority Complex

Here is another part of my "evolution of sexism" theory. This part is pretty hypothetical, and just the result of what I know about young childhoodand psychology.

Young boys develop a jealousy of their mothers, to some extent, and of girls. They do this before they can consciously understand the jealousy. Males claim that they wouldn’t want to give birth, but really, men’s contribution to life is hard to understand, especially at an early stage of life. Our own species didn't understand it until relatively recently.

I remember, as a young child, simulating birth with my mother, hiding under her shirt, then coming out. I cannot imagine that little boys didn’t do something similar, and I cannot imagine that it doesn’t have an effect on young male brains to know that they will never, ever be able to create life in the same way.

So the unconscious mind developed a slight jealousy, as it often does, and started postulating about how men were better than women in order to make up for what seemed like a disparity. As young men developed consciousness, they forgot the root of the presumptions, but still held on to them, and then projected them onto the women and girls around them.

It would be hard to convince me that this doesn't actually happen, since it makes sense and I'm not sure how one would create an experiement to disprove this hypothesis. I mean, we've had the experiment happening all around us for millenia, and this just seems to be the result. So maybe it isn't so much a hypothesis as an interpretation. But there are definitely other, perhaps stronger factors at play in sexism, the strongest of which being the insecurity with paternity.

Weddings, whats the point?

One of my favorite people, a former employee, explained the significance of this day. She told me that 7 is God's number, because he rested on the seventh day after working for 6 days to create the earth. Consequently, three times as many people are getting married today than on any other day. Source

To me, marriage is the creation of legal kin, as opposed to directly biologically related kin. We seem to understand that a child has the right to see her dying mother or father, but not every kid gets to come into the hospital room. Marriage takes two biological strangers from the human species and gives them the rights we allow biological kinfolk.

Women know that their kids are their own, and that by getting pregnant, they will pass on their genetic material. Men do not have this luxury, which is just one part of my "evolution of sexism" theory, and they know it. The ultimate goal of life is to sustain life, and pass on genetic material. Women have more control over this than men, and men have been punishing us for it for a long time.

But marriage, itself, is not necessarily a punishment, especially not if the man in question can provide the woman with viable pregnancies and help her effectively raise the new people. No, the punishment comes in the form of "women don't have the minds for math" and "don't be such a girl" - not to mention rape and murder¹ after the wedding and damn, everything else I talk about.

I don't know how much more explanation I need to give before I can get to my point, but I'm satisfied with what I've already written. Many cultures have realized that the joining of two adults needs to be recognized to be official. Hence, the wedding. Some weddings are short, sweet, and to the point. Some weddings last a week. Some weddings include the slaughter of a whole cow and a town feast. Some weddings include a million dollar dress and 5,000 famous people. My parents wedding was in a small local Catholic church. The bride wore a knee length brown-green dress, the groom wore a tan couderoy suit [hey, it was the 70's]. The reception was a dinner in the church basement, and their "honeymoon" was an afternoon outing to a local lake.

But so many women put their entire lives into their wedding. I admit, as I child, I liked to play wedding, if only for the pomp. But I also liked to play queen and royal palace for the same reason, often with the chess set. I went to wedddings as a child. The dresses were beautiful, yes, but the couple often made it to the reception so much later because of the photographer. The speeches ran long, when all I wanted to do was eat and dance.

And now, we all love to hear about bridezillas and elaborate weddings - well, all except me. Despite what I believe about the true purpose of weddings, I can't get past the blatent sexism and patrimony of the ceremony. In the past, both the man and the woman were leaving their respective parents' house, but the man stands at the head of the church, with his buddies, while the women put on an elaborate parade. In the end, the grand marshall, the man who paid for the whole thing, escorts his property down the aisle to give her to this other man, for his use.

Weddings are called "her day" because in the traditional, sexist reality, weddings were her last opportunity to be beautiful and show off, and she was now a wife, destined to begin a life of servitude to this handsome man. He doesn't worry about the wedding because he knows that his life will continue as normal, but better than normal because now he has someone to take care of him - just like his mother once did.

But so many non-famous women still want the huge wedding. They want all the pomp, all the gradeur, and all the tradition. The song must be just right, the dress must be perfect, the vows must be beautiful, the flowers must be breathtaking. And in the end, who gives a crap? It is one day, one dress, and a bunch of meaningless words. The real wedding is in the signing of the document, not in "I do". The point of a wedding is to tell everyone that you are now legally related to someone else, nothing more, nothing less.

My parents walked down the aisle together. They gave themselves to each other. My mother might have worn that dress again. My parents married as adults, and they did it without fuss, or without going into tons of debt.

Again, how can love exist here?

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/07/05/damon.india.widows/index.html

Do young Hindu children look at their mother, preparing to abandon her the moment their father dies?

At the same time that I am glad that my culture does not believe that a woman's worth is entirely based on another person, I know how easy it would be for culture to revert.

Then again, why do we feel so much pity for the 22 year-old war widow? I'm 26, and I can see my life spread out before me like a great valley of milk and honey. When bad things happen, I just close that chapter and move on. Sure, it hurts to lose a loved one, especially when it is so unexpected, but how many ex-boyfriends do we never ever want to see again? Admittedly, thats a little harsh, but the point is that the 22 year-old war widow has probably 75% of her life yet to live.

I have a post in mind - an unfinished post - about why sexists hate when women are famous. The long and short is that men feel that they are the important ones - all based on the reaction the hunting party would get when they returned to camp with the big kill. The camp was celebrating the arrival of meat, protein, and the hunting party thought that made them special. So men assumed that they deserved all the celebration.

This doesn't even get into the innate and unconcious jealousy men have of women. Women know that their kids are their own, and that by getting pregnant, they will pass on their genetic material. Men do not have this luxury, which is just one part of my "evolution of sexism" theory, and they know it. The ultimate goal of life is to sustain life, and pass on genetic material. Women have more control over this than men, and men have been punishing us for it for a long time.

In the tradition detailed above, the punishment is the devaluing women so much that their entire worth is based on their association with a single living man. Conversely, he is so important that his death is more than one death, it must be two. So I ask, how can a whole society be so horrible? How does a woman enter a marriage knowing that she will end her own life cast out of her family? How can a mother love a child she knows will only love her as long as her husband lives? Thank goodness there are those, within the society, who won't stand for it.

Advice' could cut Caesarean rate

A computer decision analysis system could help cut the rate of Caesareans performed in the UK, experts claim.

How dumb does one have to be to see the monetary difference between the natural process of human birth and major abdominal surgery? Which do you think would earn a doctor more money?

Here is something I don't get. Millions of women give birth every day. Before modern times, or without educated [medical] assistance, a big chunk of those women die too. But I cannot think of a single person I know with a mother who died in childbirth. Having a baby is, by no means, a small feat, but it is a daily occurrence, and many women come back from the process just as strong as before. So why are we, young women without children, yet, made to feel terrified about the process? Why don't we get a full view of the whole process, from the basic knowledge of the two stages of labor, to that nasty little fact that your bowels release as you push. It is birth, not a trade secret. Why don't we know more about it?

Well, we can start with the obvious - that men won't go through it and they are a mixture of horrified, jealous, and disinterested. This is something women do, and have always done, without any help from men. And even when we want men’s help, they do like my ex did when we were making an entertainment center. They don’t take the back seat as a resource, they want to take center stage and control the whole process. Many women can and do give birth without outside assistance. This makes men insecure, and we have a system of interference that has come in several different ways. Here are a few I can remember off hand

Birth on the back: possibly the worst position for birth, increases the need for episiotomies, but it does provide a comfortable view for the doctor assisting this natural process, made more difficult by tilting the birth canal up.
Episiotomy: Vaginal tearing happens, this is an incision. Any medical student can tell you that jagged cuts heal faster than incisions
Inducement before the due date: A fad that has caught on - it fooled a friend of mine. She was due on the 19th, I think, then suddenly, on the 18th, we got the announcement that her baby was born, but there were complications. Pretty scary complications, traumatic complications, but she lived and can have more kids. I told this to my mother, and she interrupted the story and said "AND THEY WONDER WHY!" *NEWS FLASH* the doctor or nurse that delivers the baby gets paid for that delivery, regardless of who the pre-natal doctor was. Inducing birth is a way for those doctors to ensure that they are present for and get the money from that mother, regardless of the adverse effects to mother, child, and family.

In the 19th century, the AMA was a group of patriarchal "thugs" for lack of a better term, trying to discourage the use of traditional healers, including midwives. They didn't seem to go after dentistry in the same way. Standardizing medicine and eliminating some of the evils of "traditional" healers has been very good, but it also managed to pathologize birth. The AMA seemed to reject the knowledge of midwives and instead used their knowledge and fucked up birth, in one way or another, to this day. Oh, babies are born, and mothers are happy and alive, but the process suddenly became a nightmare. And doctors still don't want to listen to midwives. Why not?

What does it take to become a midwife? Do we even know? I’d like to know. Why not embrace the practice? Is it because midwives are normally women learning in a gynocentric way? Is the knowledge from medical school so magical that no other person could possibly know how to help pregnant women? Lets stop this "I have a degree, so only I can tell you to take an anti-inflammatory, then ice and elevate your arm" bullshit. Doctors are experts, but we don't need to go to them for everything. And who says that doctors have cornered the market on medical expertise? The field is only about 150 years old, maybe younger, but traditions like midwifery are much older. Why don’t we draw the wisdom out of these traditions? We learned that leaches are beneficial in some cases, so why not other traditional practices? Lets get off our high horse and learn from history.

But I’m coming to see that all sexism is based on the desire for men to be as sure about paternity as we are about maternity. Keeping women pigeonholed into certain social roles, encouraging them to marry only one man, and have sex with only one man, and the extremes of stoning adulterers and keeping a woman under house arrest by marrying her, providing for her so she doesn’t “need” a job, denying her a driver’s license, and then moving out to a remote suburb. That is the easy and selfish way, and it has worked, to some degree, for men, for men with no compassion, for quite some time. It sucked for women, it still does. And it actually isn’t THAT reliable. A woman who is kept prisoner by her mate because he thinks she will cheat is probably more likely to cheat than not, just because she will grow to resent that man. A more reliable, but more difficult approach is the enlightened approach. This happens when men realize that women care about men’s insecurities over paternity. And they discuss their motivations and accept limitations. Men need to accept their insecurity and work to reduce it and women need to respect it. It is a very simplistic approach to the basic premise of communicating with people and trying to understand them and trying to work together. Who knows what the paternity success rate is for the traditional and the enlightened method might be, but it is easy to tell that, with the latter, each partner is more likely to feel secure and happy.

So, how did I got off on that tangent? Oh yes – controlling the way women give birth is one of those typical patriarchy trying to control women things. Midwifery was a woman’s thing, but the AMA grabbed it, and now, only a male doctor could deliver a baby, while a woman was flat on her back – oh, the vagina might tear and get messy? Make an incision then stitch it up! Ooops, cut too far that time….