quote:

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If more modern women understood that the victims of The Great Witch Hunt were not witches in either the Neo-Pagan or the Satanist sense of the term, but simply women whose behavior was perceived as threatening male authority, the lesson of history might serve to motivate them to risk being labled trouble-makers and to fight for their rights rather than put up with the daily injustices against women that are the legacy of the patriarchy.

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It seems to me there were lots of factors at play here. Torture and killing for profit of the Inquisitors and the church. There must have certainly been a twisted sexual motivation on the part of many Inquisitors too.

I think the "Crones" were probably not the prefered target of the Inquisitors, but probably just victims of mass hysteria.

I think both authors miss something very significant, however.

It struck me when the second article mentioned the Jews.

Both the witch hunts, and anti-semitism started at about the same time, 1320.

A couple of good resources is watching the article (I believe which still runs on CBC) The Burning Times. Also a good book that talks about the medical side is For Her Own Good.

Don't forget politics...although the Inquisition was deemed "religious" in motivation, there is plenty of evidence King Philip III saw it as a way to get rid of inconvenient political enemies. Jews and Muslims were exiled during this same period--and these women likewise were seen as disobedient to the status quo, possibly breeding insurrection. In that way it is like the American religious right--the people doing the "dirty work" believed in what they were doing (in this case, Dominicans brought in from afar to conduct the actual inquiry; ignorant of the local political situation), but were rubes cynically used by political groups knowingly consolidating their own power (and directly profiting--and therefore knew exactly what they were doing). For this reason I tend to think of these phenomenon as political and not religious. I don't blame socialism for Stalin, and I don't blame Christianity for the Inquisition.

I am less familiar with puritan (Protestant) witch hunts, but a similar consolidation of political power took place once the alternative practices were eradicated. (Stalin would do likewise, to Christians, Muslims and Jews; as Mao did to Tibetan Buddhists and the Dalai Lama.)

[ September 20, 2002: Message edited by: SuperGimp ]

You would be looking in the dark corners hidden away from view, the dirty going ons of the Christian faith. Few alterboys have been buggered down at city hall or at Queens Park these resent months past. Perhaps this is the latest attrosity combined with the homophobic tendencies and the lower esteem the Vatican hold for women.

How does that compare to the Darkest aspects of Islam?

Slick Willy, when you say "Hog Heaven"--are you referring to ham and bacon or Harley-Davidsons? (I don't eat meat, but I do confess to visiting the local Hog Heaven now and then to look at HDs I could never afford.)

As for your question--buggery has not been in the "dark corners" lately--it has been all over the news for 6 months straight. We really do not know WHAT lurks in the dark corners of Islam, other than what we learned of the Taliban. For instance, the Shari'ah rules are being upheld in various locales now--and that NEVER used to happen:

http://www.amnestyusa.org/news/2002/nigeria08202002.html

To answer for my esteemed Canadian Colleague,

"Hog Heaven" -I'm pretty certain- is for Hogtown, which is a nickname for Toronto.

AND WHAT, may I ask, do you have against disabled superheroes?? I suppose you think only able-bodied people bitten by radioactive spiders or from the planet Krypton can be superheroes???

TRINITTY: To answer for my esteemed Canadian Colleague,

"Hog Heaven" -I'm pretty certain- is for Hogtown, which is a nickname for Toronto.

Here in the USA, HOG stands for Harley-Owners-Group...which was a nice coincidence since huge Harleys first got called HOGS by (I think) the Hells Angels, since they make that deafening snorting noise when they idle...also they are GAS HOGS! Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell has a patriotically-oriented one: http://www.senate.gov/~campbell/

Sorry for subject drift...back to the witches! (Everyone check out that Amnesty International link in my last post, about Amina Lawal's death sentence! There is a letter you can send.)

[ September 20, 2002: Message edited by: SuperGimp ]

Tommy thinks all religions are contributors to mass mental illness.

Does it matter if he thinks the murderous bastards who run under the "Christian" banner are better or worse than the murderous bastards who run under the "Muslim" banner?

----------

I don't give two hoots if those women who were burned at the stake were "Pagans", which means anyone who didn't fall on the knees and allow their faiths to be hijacked by Christianity. To say that they "weren't even pagans" implies that their murders would have been justified if they had indeed been "Pagans". It was WRONG.

quote:

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I was never really sold on the idea that the witches were predominantly pagans, or some kind of echo of paganism.

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Well, the highest estimation of deaths related to the witch hunt is 9 million. I can believe that some of them may have been practicing their old religions. Hell, my mom still practices it in some ways, as do I. But the victims were predominantly Christian - and devout ones too.

I sympathise with neo-pagans, but that IS what they are. NEO-pagans. I have a hard time accepting that their religion is directly derived from the Dark Ages. It's an obviously post-modern creation.

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Well, the highest estimation of deaths related to the witch hunt is 9 million.

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And yes, from what I've read, 9 million is humungous and very likely wrong.

The idea of witches was around long before that, in various forms; not always persecuted, but always and everywhere, feared. In Europe, witches were feared (and consulted) before Christianity gave power to the anti-witch factions.

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Paganism is not a religion to begin with

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FLOTSAM: Probably, aside from the odd american hermit here or about, the only true Christians (my definition) - outside of the monasteries of course - are in caves or in the desert/wilderness...in Greece, Turkey, Syria, Egypt...

All I can say is, yall ain't been to the south lately.

edited to add

Here's a hint: think waaay back.

(2lb)

[ September 20, 2002: Message edited by: flotsom ]

Better than half the accusers were other women, BTW. And contrary to the myth, practising midwives were much less likely to be accused of witchcraft than other women.

One pagan site--the Covenant of the Goddess--has a good critical reevaluation of the persecution of witches
here.

Another good online account of the witchunts--including modern examples--comes from Gendercide Watch.

And if you really want the definitive guide to primary and secondary accounts of the witch trials, go to the Open Directory Project's witch hunt page.

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All I can say is, yall ain't been to the south lately

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The south of what? Whole lotta Catholics below Texas; a relatively small cache of Fundamentalists above. Neither group is notable for its Christian charity and mercy.

But then, Christianity, even before it became state religion all over the place, has never been all that attentive to whatever Jesus was maundering on about. There was nothing Christian about the Crusades: they were just another open-ended war on somebody with stuff worth taking (and a handy disposal for the nobility's more bellicose extra sons).

....In all probability, not a single element of the Wiccan story is true. The
evidence is overwhelming that Wicca is a distinctly new religion, a
1950s concoction influenced by such things as Masonic ritual and a
late-nineteenth-century fascination with the esoteric and the occult,
and that various assumptions informing the Wiccan view of history are
deeply flawed. Furthermore, scholars generally agree that there is no
indication, either archaeological or in the written record, that any
ancient people ever worshipped a single, archetypal goddess -- a
conclusion that strikes at the heart of Wiccan belief.

More at

Contrary to what seems to be popular opinion, I'm not for using the Witch Hunts as a reason to attack Christianity, and I think most attacks on Christianity that cite the witch hunts are off base.

It's rediculous to hold today's Christians accountable for the actions of Christians hundreds of years ago.

About the only salient thing that Christians could be asked on this account, is to inquire as to what changes in philosophy has there been that would prevent a reocurrance? The fact that there has been none, is certainly ammunition for the cause of keeping Christianity away from legislatures.

Be that as it may, I think the religion aspect tends to cloud the more important issue of trying to figure out what really drives witch hunts.

Sure, we can point to the cynics who profited materially or through perverse pleasure as being fomentors, but what is it about humans that we can get caught up in an hysteria like that?

I believe it had a lot to do with the horror of the Black Death, which must have seemed, if not in fact was, the end of the world. People were scared witless, no doubt, and "witches" and Jews became targets for that fear.

With that fear rampant in the remnant of the post Black Death population, it seems to me the cynics in power used it to their advantage.

A sceptic like myself might point to education on critical thinking as the answer to the problem, and that is part of it.

But I think the real lesson here (and I might be displaying my talent for the obvious) is that to prevent mass hysteria and other popular dellusions, we need to ensure the security of people.

[ September 21, 2002: Message edited by: Tommy_Paine ]

quote:

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What it does suggest is that there was a division of labor and activity" -- not necessarily the egalitarian utopia that Goddess worshippers have assumed. (...)He points out that almost all the female figurines at Çatalhöyük came from rubbish heaps; the enthroned nude woman was found in a grain bin.

---

For all the author questions the assumptions made by some archeologists, others seem to have free licence to make assumptions.

A division of labor does not mean sexism, it does not even mean a society was not egalitarian. Just because patriarchal societies devalue "women's work" does not mean all cultures do.

I'd like to know what "rubbish heap" refers to. Were the people of Çatalhöyük great consumers of chip and instant noodle packages? Or was he referring to a compost, or an area with a bunch of broken pots?

Similarly, to extrapolate that placing an item in a grain bin means that it did not have religious significance is to make another cross-cultural assumption.

Just because earlier anthropologists made false assumptions about Çatalhöyük does not make Hodder any more objective. All anthropologists have a cultural schema which influences their interpretation of physical evidence, but this article seems to paint feminists and Wiccans as "romantic", "emotional", and therefore "unscientific". Or at least less "scientific" than anti-feminists.

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SUCH faith may explain why Wicca is thriving despite all the things about it that look like hokum(...)Practicing Wicca is a way to have Christianity without, well, the burdens of Christianity

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Really now. I'm not Wiccan, but if I was, I'd find that insulting to say the least. "Hokum", referring to Gardenarian theories of the origins of "wicca", which is what this article focusses on, but to say the entire faith is "hokum"?

I refer to both continents in this hemisphere, true. Lots of Christians in both "souths"...(Now come on, when I use "yall" and "ain't", I think you know which south I mean.)

Actually, according to Carl Bernstein's book HIS HOLINESS, the Catholic Church spends over 4 billion dollars in charity a year, which makes it the largest charitable institution in the world. (If you mean non-monetary charity, then that's subjective.)

Also from the Atlantic Monthly
...In 1993 Eller had
published a sympathetic sociological study of feminist spirituality,
Living in the Lap of the Goddess, which many in the movement put on
their required-reading lists. Her recent work thus carries a tinge of
betrayal, inasmuch as it puts her firmly in Hodder and Meskell's camp.
Eller points out that almost no serious archaeologist working today
believes that these ancient cultures were necessarily matriarchal or
even woman-focused, and most do not interpret any of the things
unearthed by Mellaart and Gimbutas as necessarily depicting
goddesses or genitalia.

http://archive.salon.com/books/feature/2000/06/28/matriarchy/print.html

[ September 21, 2002: Message edited by: Ed Weatherbee ]

Matriarchal myth, Eller argues, is actively harmful at worst and at best unnecessary. In the first place, she points out, matriarchalists tend to glorify "female essentialness" -- that is, to portray women as innately and naturally good, kind and loving human beings, and to emphasize the undying differences between the sexes.

quote:

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Furthermore, scholars generally agree that there is no
indication, either archaeological or in the written record, that any
ancient people ever worshipped a single, archetypal goddess

---

Balls. Most scholars are men. Figures of women are found world-wide in the archaeological record. If there was another symbol so prolific (say, figures of cats or rabbits) it would certainly be considered a major find. I agree that it can't be related to a single goddess, but it certainly has meaning beyond "ancient pornography." (My third year archaeology prof's view. Frickin' old fart.)

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I have never figured out why feminists, in particular, would want to glorify this.

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What feminists have you been talking to? Many of us can't stand the "earth mother" myth of womanhood. But it doesn't change the fact that as a symbol of fertility and growth the female form suits better than the man.

[ September 21, 2002: Message edited by: skadie ]

"Most scholars are men." So? Does that make it wrong? The article does not deny that female figures abound, just that they are not more ubiquitous than male figures, nor do they demonstrate the existence of any form of equality or matriarchy.

As for the female form and fertility and growth, it seems to me to be the flip side of the coin of seeing the male form as being inherently better suited to expression strength and power. Is this a desirable result? I disagree, anyway, the phallus is a very common nature symbol.

quote:

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"Most scholars are men." So? Does that make it wrong? The article does not deny that female figures abound, just that they are not more ubiquitous than male figures, nor do they demonstrate the existence of any form of equality or matriarchy.

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No one is objective. Not feminist anthropologists, not sexist ones.

I suppose repetition will do nothing for people who are just hunting for a feminist to bash...

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We need to be able to inquire as to why patriarchy is so ubiquitous and "successful" everywhere it exists without presupposing its social construction of whatever nature, or claiming that paternity is "discovered" (many animals know about it),

---

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Whence this near-uniformity of sexuality the world over, longer than history can remember? People claim that there has been vast variation, but in that variation one can find a kernel of the same misogyny.

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Explain how you would recognize a society without misogyny, (assuming that you were brought up in North America- or according to your argument, Earth) having only ever lived in a misogynist society? Your entire view of the world is constructed by society, how exactly are we supposed to believe that you have somehow stepped out of that, when no one else can?

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Archaeology is an art, not a science. We'd do well to remember that.

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As for the animals, I will give the simple example of lions. A new male lion in the pride has a tendency to kill existing infants. Why? Certainty of paternity!

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Balls again. The certainty of paternity story is the commonly accepted and highly prolific THEORY of a bunch of male observers.

When my prof made the comment that the goddess images were simply "primitive porn" 350 students wrote it down in their note books. Some of those students are surely archaeologists today with students of their own. I hope this illustrates my problem with any commonly accepted and highly prolific theories.

A reminder that even if there was never a goddess cult spanning the world we can safely say the goddess was a much bigger part of spirituality in the past than it is today. (My handle is in there if you're interested. )

[ September 22, 2002: Message edited by: skadie ]

[ September 22, 2002: Message edited by: skadie ]

quote:

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Since it's my hobby to help colonize the social sciences and humanities with the ideas and methods of the natural and formal sciences.

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quote:

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When my prof made the comment that the goddess images were simply "primitive porn" 350 students wrote it down in their note books. Some
of those students are surely archaeologists today with students of their own. I hope this illustrates my problem with any commonly accepted
and highly prolific theories.

---

While I am not sure it changes anything at all about highly prolific theories, it is suggestive of the gullability of the public as a whole.

Seems to me that there are some things, that no matter how blatantly false they are, will always have a percentage of people going to great lengths to convince themselves and other as truth beyond suspicion.

For example while some will accept that there is no alternative to the existance of an actual God type being watching and interacting in their lives
based on nothing more than a "feeling" they have that is called faith.

While on the other hand, some would dismiss the thought as wishful thinking or a notion to frighten children into behaving, while happily having faith that the universe is indeed infinite because they have a "feeling" that this is in fact the case.

I don't see it as a gender significant issue.
I think that it can go much deeper into the psychy
than that.

Maybe it can be connected with our fear of isolation or being alone. We are a social species, as we can see ourselves through all races and locations gather togeather in groups.

So why isn't spirituality just a manifestation within the mind to help deal with stressful situations where, we can undestand, having a friend who is on your side would be very comforting? Not only that but one that will accept all your short comings and in some ways even make up for them?

Further upon recognizing this manifestation in others, those of lesser moral fiber, find an attractive target to manipulate and primed to submit to a strong psychological strike. Hence the uncanny willingness of some to believe that someone they just met happens to talk to that very friend that shares in your own hardships and triumphs. They are quite willing to part with damn near anything as a good friend would do, and so the dynamic between spirituality and religion is forged.

So while I see spirituality as a good and healthy thing I find religion to be the vehicle used to deliver the prey unto the preditor.

But, we see so many other examples of mysogyny in other cultures and religions that are much older.

Greek women were certainly not treated well. "A woman for duty, a boy for pleasure, and a sheep for discretion."

And, even today we see terrible things happen to women in Hindu dominated India.

Being a reductionist, I do think the origin of this mysogyny originates with the issue of paternity. While women are, with the exception of rare circumstances, always sure they are putting all their resouces into raising thier own genetic material, men have never had the same assurance.

I think as time has gone on, men have reacted to this in increasingly bizzarre and horrible ways, until mysogyny has taken up a life of it's own.

No, the witch hunts were not begun so men could ensure paternity. But, the paternity issue had laid the ground work. Even before we became "civilized", there was a patina of mysogyny ingrained in our proto-cultures. Indeed, it is part of who we are.

quote:

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. A new male lion in the pride has a tendency to kill existing infants. Why? Certainty of paternity!

---

That's not the only reason, and maybe not the primary one. They do it so the females will be ready to mate sooner. In any case, the lion doesn't know: he merely follows a genetic imperative. Male cats, like primates, are horny all the time, not only in season. And males of many species are jealous when the females are too busy with young to pay attention to them. So, it's not that simple...

quote:

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since reality is just a matter of what you find convenient. I find this to be an intellectually desiccated position. The interpretation of lion behaviour is not merely an issue of your cultural perspective: you have to be able to justify your perspective in terms of an evolutionary model, unless you are a creationist.

---

Let us take an even simpler example. There is a species of insect where the female eats the male after copulation. This would appear to be a very destructive tactic, since it ruins the male's chances of sending its genes through more than one female.

Nonetheless, this species survives and propagates because reproduction is assured.

There is not a complex relativistic explanation for why the female consumes the male. It is simply the workings of genes that govern behavior. Period.

The Darwinian evolutionary model is compatible with so-called 'punctuated equilibrium', because the PE people mis-stated Darwin's 'gradualism' to imply only a constant incremental evolutionary rate, rather than a more muted stagewise progression than the PE types would prefer.

quote:

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Do not make the mistake of assuming that there are no uniform interpretations of animal behavior, simply because you want to trash males.

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It is to make one weep. (Or maybe just get pissed off.)

[ September 22, 2002: Message edited by: writer ]

quote:

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Balls again. The certainty of paternity story is the commonly accepted and highly prolific THEORY of a bunch of male observers.

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You appear to be discounting a logical explanation for the behavior of the animals on the basis of the gender of the developer of the hypothesis.

quote:

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Furthermore, scholars generally agree that there is no indication, either archaeological or in the written record, that any
ancient people ever worshipped a single, archetypal goddess -- a conclusion that strikes at the heart of Wiccan belief.

---

I don't know where the author has gotten his information about Wiccanism, because there are plenty of Wiccans I know who worship male gods. There's a whole movement alone worshipping Anubis. Wiccanism is extremely varied. I worship primarly goddesses, but many Wiccans I know worship both male and female and focus on the balance of energies.

I find this quote disturbing, in that it is discounting/ignoring/dismissing oral tradition and record. A record that many communities and particularly women have had to rely on throughout history. If we're basing an entire argument based on written or "archaelogical" record, I would agree that the very argument is patriarchal in nature.

But the source of your disturbance says just that!

May we presume that, as you consider yourself left wing, that you imply that the association of unisexual or heterosexual gods and goddesses with the right wing is purely coincidental or, as you say, funny.

The Wiccah tradition may not be that old compared to others. Has anyone reading this noticed how the 7,000-year-old Devic culture of India had gods and goddesses pretty much in balance. In fact - unlike Judaism, Christianity and Islam - the balance was considered essential.

quote:

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As for the animals, I will give the simple example of lions. A new male lion in the pride has a tendency to kill existing infants. Why? Certainty of paternity! Chimps and other mammals also have paternity-aware behaviours.

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Until lions start having institutions like marriage, military, or anything else that is in any way comparable to an institutional power dynamic such as patriarchy, there is no analogy.

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So the claim that you can't infer objective truths from formal models of gender interests and bits of physical evidence that we have sounds rather incredible to me.

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At any rate, I'm not saying that there is no such thing as right or wrong. I'm just saying (god forbid!) that white boy anthropologists are no more likely to be objective in their inferences than anyone else.

quote:

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Being a reductionist, I do think the origin of this mysogyny originates with the issue of paternity. While women are, with the exception of rare circumstances, always sure they are putting all their resouces into raising thier own genetic material, men have never had the same assurance.

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People can speculate about the origins of patriarchy all they like. But when it comes to this kind of pre-ancient historical theorizing, speculation is all we have.

quote:

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Quite to the contrary, what I've seen is women being very polite while men - once again - end up dominating a thread in the feminism forum.

---

quote:

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You appear to be discounting a logical explanation for the behavior of the animals on the basis of the gender of the developer of the hypothesis.

---

quote:

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Ask any historian about the usefulness of oral history and the ability of human beings to remember things differently .

---

nonesuch: But you do agree that various species follow patterns of behaviour that attempt to balance conflicting gender interests, and that there is no reason why humans should be an exception. In fact, the onus is very much on the side of radical social constructivists to demonstrate that it is otherwise and that such a demonstration is unlikely because it is absurd. As for paternity-awareness, I meant that in a very broad, functional sense--as opposed to animals that do not give males much compensatory behaviour for their genetic interests--the kinds of animals that spawn vast numbers of offspring in one sitting, I would imagine, tend to not be "paternity-aware." I brought this up in support of the claim that human beings didn't "discover" paternity as it is unlikely that they didn't already know. And that patriarchal structures didn't emerge in a "catastrophic" way, but developed gradually as human cultures developed. If patriarchy was catastrophic, I doubt it would have been so stable
or ubiquitous. So while human beings have more elaborate rituals around paternity, we are fundamentally similar to chimpanzees.

skadie: Yes, I realize that you don't subscribe to Darwin, which I find quite appalling, in particular as you have not demonstrated any evidence for any other model in conflict with Darwin--some of which are listed on other threads. The only justification is that, despite all the physical and formal evidence, you dislike it for political reasons. But while we may be motivated to take one position or another for political reasons, one of us must have a superior claim to truth. Otherwise, we can know nothing...

'lance: Perhaps you may never settle debate on these issues--but that doesn't mean that one position isn't more correct than another, it just means that one party is deluded (more than the other). So while there may always be debate on zoological interpretation, I consider this particular debate to have been firmly resolved in my favour long before we began this discussion. Once again, the onus is on other to demonstrate why evolution isn't relevant, since numerous animals demonstrate some form of gender-interest-management behaviour.

writer, etc: I don't know who you're addressing those comments to, but I certainly don't apologize for pushing the discussion in this direction as I think it is relevant to most such discussions.

So to connect all this back to the question of the witch hunts, the fact that the witch hunts were targeted not at pagans but at "independent" ordinary women is quite interesting as it illustrates the ubiquity and vicious tenaciousness of patriarchy over know time and space. Why is it so widespread, uniform despite trivial cultural details, and stable? I claim that once we gain a better understanding of the source of that stability, we will have a better grasp of what sort of transition is required to some other stable state, and we will also have a better grasp of the conditions on more desirable stable states themselves. This understanding is related in some way to biology, I claim.

On a last note, what I have read from Ed I have not typically agreed with, but the notion that oral histories have the same status as archaeological data is quite absurd. Play a game of telephone and tell me if you believe that. If archaeological data is patriarchal, too bad--the difference between it and oral history is not optional. I would add formal/mathematical models of reproductive interest to the list of things more reliable than oral histories. Too bad history from women's perspective has been wiped out/not recorded. Oh well.

I do not count the military as a necessary component of patriarchy. Are you willing to claim that a society with equality between the sexes would never have conflicts that have the potential for war? If you do, it's simply a restating of the notion that men must be tempered by women's natural gentleness.

quote:

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But you do agree that various species follow patterns of behaviour that attempt to balance conflicting gender interests, and that there is no reason why humans should be an exception.

---

I don't see religion as a cause, either. There have been all kinds of gods and goddesses - both benign and cruel; both life-affirming and destructive; both kinds of fertility symbol - all worshipped by both sexes. It doesn't make any difference to medieval Christians whether ancient peoples had good or bad godesses or how the archeological records are interpreted: archeology hadn't been invented - they didn't know. RC had already subsumed all the current, local godesses in the Virgin Mary cult, so they were no threat. Non-Christian magic (particularly science) may have been a threat, but that was almost exclusively in the masculine domain.

Anyway, religion doesn't determine social structure, but is a product of social structure. What people are willing to believe depends on their previous experience. On whose authority they are willing to act depends on the distribution of power and property.

How did human males and females become alienated from one another? I don't think reproduction or spirituality hold the the answer. Temperament may: possibly, women opposed what men wanted to do; kept saying things like, "You can't go to war until you've fixed the thatch and planted the yams." and it bacame necessary to shut them up. But i'm pretty sure that wasn't the main reason.

[ September 23, 2002: Message edited by: nonesuch ]

adlib: I do not see any necessary connection between evolutionary theories and misogyny except that feminists have not provided an alternative interpretation of the consequences of the ideas, making it seem like their is such a misogynist link--only one contestant, you know. This I see as being due to influences on feminism and the left in general that have produced a discourse of hostility to certain kinds of scientific discussion that is not deserved by the discussions themselves. I claim that evolutionary psychology is one such area--its contribution to the discussion of the origins of patriarchy should be seen as an invitation to view other evolutionary influences that can license another structure that is less patriarchal.

quote:

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May we presume that, as you consider yourself left wing, that you imply that the association of unisexual or heterosexual gods and goddesses with the right wing is purely coincidental or, as you say, funny.

The Wiccah tradition may not be that old compared to others. Has anyone reading this noticed how the 7,000-year-old Devic culture of India had gods and goddesses pretty much in balance. In fact - unlike Judaism, Christianity and Islam - the balance was considered essential.

But the source of your disturbance says just that!

---

I think the source of my disturbance says a lot more than "just that!"

quote:

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May we presume that, as you consider yourself left wing, that you imply that the association of unisexual or heterosexual gods and goddesses with the right wing is purely coincidental or, as you say, funny.

---

It's better not to presume me implying anything since I rarely do and prefer shooting from the hip rather than circular arguments. It's safe to say that you should feel free to take whatever I say at face value.

My comment on the right wing had more to do with the tone of this discussion feminist forum, more than the discussion itself.

quote:

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I'm always kind of suspicious about basing anything on "oral tradition". Ask any historian about the usefulness of oral history and the ability of human beings to remember things differently . Events become distorted within one's memories during your lifetime.

And someone else said: typically agreed with, but the notion that oral histories have the same status as archaeological data is quite absurd.

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I'm more suspicious of a system that pooh pooh's an oral tradition knowing fully well that many marginalised people (a lot of them being women) throughout history have had only that to communicate their history. I'm not saying there is no room for error, (I may forget having my ears pieced when I'm 70, but I'm really not likely to forget the goddess I'm worshipping) but I'm not going to discount it based on an "academic" system almost entirely patriarchal.

Edited to fix my lousy formatting

[ September 23, 2002: Message edited by: Shenanigans ]

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We've been here before. I still maintain that humans didn't become concerned with ensuring paternity until after they were settled in permanent buildings, on permanent land. It's not about children or genes: it's about property.

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The history of women's roles in religious observances and in ancient society is very relevant because the role of women throughout judeo-christian history is pivotal to the persecution of mostly (but not exclusively) women during the holy inquisition. There is a great deal of feminist scholarship on the topic, and I'm surprised that so little space has been devoted to a feminist discussion of the 400 year persecution of so-called witches and heretics.

This being the feminist forum an' all.

I would've expected some kind of discussion on persecutions and types of genocide, how society chooses groups to be vilified and why, and how the particular persecution of women fits the pattern. Tommy P made the interesting point that social instability resulting from years and years of plague and pestilence created the environment where identifiable groups could be tortured and murdered en masse. What did women have in common with these other groups? What in the history of Western attitudes towards women's roles in society made women especially vulnerable to persecution? In what ways, if any, have these attitudes survived to this day? What comparisons can we make between the persecution of women in the middle ages, and campaigns of extermination in Nazi Europe, Bosnia, Cambodia, Rwanda, Ukraine?

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I may be wrong on the usefulness of "oral traditions" but, from my own family history, I don't think that much survives past four or five generation.

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In traditional societies, oral traditions can be held onto for quite a long time, and yet be accurate. In the societies where oral tradition is most useful, no one moves for generation after generation, and commonly, peoples' names include geneological information.

apart from native people, who do have valuable and accurate oral traditions, North America is unusually disjointed in this sense, and family traditions are often legends rather than fact.

Where knowledge of writing exists, reference to an "oral tradition" is often a way of excusing the absence of evidence.

For example, I believe the Mother-Goddess story
originated in a German book called "Das Muterrecht", written in the 1890's. It was adopted as part of his theology by Jung, and moved to North America when his followers set up
schools here.

That is why the "oral tradition" has to be invoked pre-1895.

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The history of women's roles in religious observances and in ancient society is very relevant because the role of women throughout judeo-christian history is pivotal to the persecution of mostly (but not exclusively) women during the holy inquisition. There is a great deal of feminist scholarship on the topic, and I'm surprised that so little space has been devoted to a feminist discussion of the 400 year persecution of so-called witches and heretics.

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Exactly. The Judeo-Christian-Muslim tradition (all one bundle) is recent. The whole idea of a single godhead (male) is the product of long-established partriarchy. It didn't cause the problem: it is a symptom and tool of the problem. If other and earlier religions assigned a different and better role to women, it's because the distribution of power in those societies favoured a religion that did so. Cart and horse, see?

The Christians didn't just pick on women: they picked on anybody who might be a threat to the power structure: heretics, pagans, Jews, Muslims, Gypsies, alchemists, astronomers... If more women were put to death than men, i suspect it's simply because, once the common people get into the spirit of accusing, spying-on, turning-on one another, they tend to go after the weakest - in the same way that chickens (domestic) will peck to death another chicken that's already injured.

[ September 24, 2002: Message edited by: nonesuch ]

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The MotherGoddess figures are real, of course, but they say very little about what was actually believed by those who made them.

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[ September 23, 2002: Message edited by: Ed Weatherbee ]

I plan on reading what I can. The man at home says that it can get a little redundant. Just something we needed for our reference library at home.

I've always found it interesting that they have scraggly hair (balding!) warts (diseased!) hair on their chins (unfeminine!) and hang out with other female witches (lesbian!).

I find it interesting that this image (unfeminine, ugly lesbians) has been invoked against suffragettes and second and third-wave feminists as a way to silence them or marginalize their issues, and perhaps even scare other women and girls from identifying with feminism/feminists.

[ September 23, 2002: Message edited by: writer ]

Doesn't make for as scary a story for children if they say that a "really pretty witch will steal them and eat them if they are bad"

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I find it interesting that this image (unfeminine, ugly lesbians) has been invoked against suffragettes and second and third-wave feminists as a way to silence them or marginalize their issues, and perhaps even scare other women and girls from identifying with feminism/feminists

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To be a witch - or herbalist, or midwife*, or astrologer - of sufficient standing to make enemies, one would need years of experience. So, most of those accused of witchcraft were probably not young.
*Abortionist? Birth-control advisor? Those things still don't sit too well HRC, and might account for the persecution of midwives.

Of course, many were young - and pretty, too, and maybe flirtatious - which is why other women denounced them. Some countries associated red hair and freckles with witchcraft. Being thin was a sign. Also immunity to disease: thus, dairymaids, who didn't catch smallpox and usually had a nicer complexion than other women.

There were any number of reasons why somebody might denounced as a witch. Fear is one, jealousy is another. We are not a very nice species.

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Certainly, lots of mention of "Father, Son and Holy Ghost" in lots of Protestant churches that I've attende

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[ September 23, 2002: Message edited by: nonesuch ]

That's quite interesting, I never cottoned on to that before you mentioned it, writer.

A few tidbits, this has become a long thread.

I don't think Chimps are concerned with paternity in the same way we are, but they are concerned. The alpha male does most of the breeding in the clan, so he can pretty much depend on the offspring having half or a good portion of his genetic material. Which, over time, is not such a good idea. I mean, look at St. Thomas, Ontario. (my attempt at levity, relax) This is probably why young female chimps temporarily wander off and seek out maurading young male chimps from other clans to have sex with, and get some depth back in the local gene pool. And of course, the male chimps do try to keep the females close to home, quite often violently or with the threat of violence, which also seems to be the male chimps idea of foreplay.

Ann Duryan and Carl Sagan put together observations about Chimp behavior, and painted a picture that showed Chimps to be very patriarchal, and, even with many a caveate about anthropomorphism, it would seem that Chimp society is very mysogynistic even by our standards.

But I digress.

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There were any number of reasons why somebody might denounced as a witch.

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Can we see the same pattern of behavior today? Are there modern "witches" that are, perhaps less horrifically dealt with, but are persecuted all the same, with perhaps the same motivations and techniques?

[ September 23, 2002: Message edited by: Tommy_Paine ]

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I mean, look at St. Thomas, Ontario. (my attempt at levity, relax)

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You demanded an existence proof of an animal that was "paternity-aware" in some way. I gave you one.

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We need to be able to inquire as to why patriarchy is so ubiquitous and "successful" everywhere it exists without presupposing its social construction of whatever nature, or claiming that paternity is "discovered" (many animals know about it),

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However, I'd still like to know what evidence you have that patriarchy is "ubiquitous". The "pre-supposition" that it is a social construction probably comes from the understanding that if patriarchy were biological either
a) it would be present absolutely everywhere with no exception (if we are to assume it is common to all humans) or
b) it would only be present in the behaviour of those groups where it has always existed, i.e., you could not take a human from an egalitarian society and find that their behaviour becomes patriarchal in a patriarchal environment. Or the opposite.

To disprove both a and b, there is for one example the Naskapi nation (aka Montagnais) of the area now known as Northern Quebec. Jesuit writings describe (in shocked and appalled language) the freedom and equality of women in the social order. It's quite the depressing account of colonization, in fact. Of course, the Jesuits also do their fair bit of romanticising, but the message is clear- children were shared, paternity considered unimportant, physical abuse of children was considered abhorrent, women/men/everybody had relationships that varied in degree of monogamy and intimacy, and people got on quite well. Much to the dismay of the Jesuits. After about a century of intense colonization, the picture does change. Eventually, the culture of the colonizer becomes dominant. Egalitarian--> patriarchal. If you want exact quotes, I still have the Jesuit diary excerpts around somewhere.

As for the lions, as usual with socio-biological poop one can just as easily come up with a counter-example. Bonobos are a good one. Their entire social structure uses homosexual genital stimulation as social "lubricant" (couldn't help it > ). Should we then assume that we have a biological imperative to massage each other's genitals each time we bring each other food?

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the notion that oral histories have the same status as archaeological data is quite absurd.

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Too bad history from women's perspective has been wiped out/not recorded. Oh well.

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If you do, it's simply a restating of the notion that men must be tempered by women's natural gentleness.

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An attractive infertile person is judged as fertile by the part of our body that regulates desire.

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writer:

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So, anyway, what about the physical depiction of witches?
I've always found it interesting that they have scraggly hair (balding!) warts (diseased!) hair on their chins (unfeminine!) and hang out with other female witches (lesbian!).

I find it interesting that this image (unfeminine, ugly lesbians) has been invoked against suffragettes and second and third-wave feminists as a way to silence them or marginalize their issues, and perhaps even scare other women and girls from identifying with feminism/feminists.

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In reality, the European witches killed varied in income. It depended- sometimes they were vagrant beggar women, killed because they were a "burden", other times it would have been widows with property the Church had it's eye on. In terms of the "gender issues" as people put it, it is certainly no coincidence that this coincided with an increase of Church/State authority/surveillance of formerly isolated regions, as well as the development of the patriarchal medical model.

As for the links to anti-semitism, as has previously been mentioned, at the same time as "witches" were persecuted, Jewish people, and any other "heretics" were also under attack. I have heard that the reason gay men are called "faggots" is because they were used as fuel for the fire (a faggot is a small stick, like those used for kindling- hence why a cigarette is called a fag in the UK). At any rate, while "witches" were accused of eating babies, so were Jews. The pointed hat was commonly worn by Jewish people during that era, and so became part of the "witches" uniform.

Add to that the buckle shoes and hatband common to American colonists of the same period, and I believe you have the fully assembled mess that is our "modern" witch.

I think the very fact that being called or portrayed as a "witch" is used as a silencing tactic goes a long way in convincing me that the witch-burnings in Europe had everything to do with the solidification of patriarchy in "Western" culture.

And I don't care what the boys think. So poo.

[ September 24, 2002: Message edited by: adlib ]

It has been pretty well demonstrated, I believe, by careful social-historical reconstruction of life in both Salem Village (the inland agricultural community where the "afflicted girls" and the first accused witches lived) and Salem Town (the newly prosperous port) at the turn of the C17-C18, that this episode was rooted in the economic and social anxiety of the families of the afflicted girls.

I won't go into detail here, but it is interesting to note that the families of the accusers were gone from the community within the next generation, whereas most of the families of the accused witches remained and prospered from the rapid shift of the community to mercantile capitalism.

I used to work in a pagan/spirituality bookstore, and here are a couple of the stories I heard.

A teenage girl in Ottawa had her pentacle ripped off her neck by "friends" who told her she was going to hell.

A woman had her very large collection of tarot decks - 30 or so - burned by her sister.

Pretty simple if you ask me, if men would like to believe they are superior in a society where women have adequate access and opportunity, they will find themselves alienated by the women that don’t share his views - this inability to expand his mind eventually pigeonholes him to join the ranks of the wonderful mythological character (provided to us by pop culture) by the name of Homer Simpson. Lisa, the show’s only intellectual, will provide the solutions to most of Homer’s problems, yet Homer, who clings fast to his sexist ideology will blunder through life without considering that perhaps this young girl can provide some insight into the nature of humanity.

“All of life’s answers can be found on TV”
Homer Simpson

I think I am mixing my Homerism’s, I also remember:

She was intelligent, beautiful, heterosexual..

[ September 24, 2002: Message edited by: Tommy_Paine ]

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I've had at least 3 people ask me if I'm a lesbian.

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It's all in who is asking, how and why. If a nice lesbian asks, it's a compliment. If a not-nice lesbian asks, it's damned uncomfortable, but still a compliment. If a man asks, he may be seeking relevant information, making an accusation or shopping for a punch in the nose. If somebody with nothing to gain or lose asks politely, they're probably just trying to keep up to date. It's a very confusing world these days: you can't blame people for being confused.

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Never attribute to Devil-worshipping conspiracies what opportunism, emotional instability, and religious bigotry are sufficient to explain.

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I have observed that there were neither witches nor bewitched in a village until they were talked and written about.

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Originally posted by skdadl:
Points of information about the best-known American outburst of witch-hunting, Salem, Mass., 1692:

(Harvard 1974).

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There was another hysteria within the last 25 years that paralled the witch hunts.

Satanic Ritual Abuse had many of they ingredients of the witch hunts and was rationalised by poor methods developed for detecting SRA, notably recovered memory therapy (RMT) (also suspect for digging up "repressed memories", possibly false or coached memories, about being raped, sexually abused, abducted by aliens).