In the beginning the LORD Thankgodiamaman created the heaven and the earth.
On the second day Thankgodiamaman gets very busy creating all kinds of things out of the void and from the face of the deep.
He said let there be light, let there be a firmament; let there be lights in the firmament and stars in the heavens; he made the land, he made the wetland; he divided the waters from the waters; he brought forth grasses, herbs and fruit trees; he made the creatures, two by two, on the land, in the waters and flying fowl, whereupon Thankgodiamaman blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful, and multiply.”
And Thankgodiamaman said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.”
He formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man, made in his image, became a living soul. And the LORD Thankgodiamaman planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.
And so it was that on the seventh day Thankgodiamaman ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work.
And so it was. Thankgodiamaman saw that it was good.
It came to pass as Adam was tending the Garden he noticed that the creatures on the land lived as mates in two by two. He looked around and saw that he was lonely. In a forlorn voice he called. LORD, LORD, why am I alone. The creatures on the land are with mates but I have none.” Thankgodiamaman looked around and saw that Adam was right. He slapped his forehead and exclaimed, “By Jove, you’re right Adam.” He caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam. When Adam was asleep he reached into Adams side and took one of his ribs. 
And the rib, which the LORD Thankgodiamaman had taken from man, made he a mate, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.”
And they were both naked, the man and his woman, and were not ashamed.
Thank God I’m A Man
Inclusive in the Jewish Prayer Book is the daily liturgy prayer for men to give thanks to God for not making them a Gentile, woman or slave.
It’s here where (all) women are treated in the same context as an outsider (non Jew) and a slave.
Genesis is the start of what became the Jukrislims (Judaic, Christian and Muslim religions)and it’s where the forceful, bitter, censure and denunciation against women began. It is what continues to this day.
I don’t know how that makes women feel, but I know if I were a woman I’d walk away from the patriarchal religions and never look back.
Afterthought?
Aren’t you describing women’s creation as an afterthought??
Yes, an afterthought and much worse
This god didn’t even have the decency to create a woman of her own accord. He took a rib from Adam to create a woman. By doing so he diminished women by creating her as an afterthought and secondary to the man.
So from the very moment of woman’s creation she was and is still treated as second-rate, inferior, lesser and unimportant.
What kind creepy person could envision enslaving half of humanity?
Oh right. A man, of course.
Why can't she be "the bone of her own bones?"
BUT, what really needs to be addressed is women’s role in perpetuating her own inferiority.
Why hasn’t she come into her own maturity of equality and escaped this heinous mythology?
Why can’t she be “the bone of her own bones?”
There is an answer for this…..
hmmm
Having been raised by a mom who was born three years before women got the right to vote in this country, and a father strongly influenced by his Victorian era born parents, you’d think I wouldn’t have had a chance, but at no time in my 60 years have I ever felt less than a man. Maybe better than men here and there, but for sure not less! Somehow my parents managed to believe girls and women had every right and ability boys and men did, and conveyed that to both my brother and me.
Do we live in a society where not all is perfect yet? Very definitely. But it is better than when my mom was trying to get ahead, become a doctor. Columbia told her straight to her face she was qualified to be admitted to med school but they didn’t accept her because she was a woman. Yet by the time I was six and wanted to be the first woman president (and the first woman supreme court justice and the first woman astronaut — my parents exposed me to a lot at a very young age), my mom and dad never laughed at me or told me I couldn’t. They responded as if it were the most natural, normal thing in the world. My mother did have the good sense to give me a few examples of some of the hurdles I might encounter, though with the expectation that I would find a way around them.
Do I wish things were even better overall in society? Yes, but thanks to those who have come before me, they are hopeful in my view, and progress continues. Am I blind to the injustices? No way. Focusing on what works, doing what helps to move things forward seems a lot more productive to me than just complaining, and focusing on how bad it is. How can each of us communicate to girls and women how great we are? How can we each support broader efforts to continue the progress? I hope this is where we put our energy. Co-worker being mistreated? Support her! Equal pay legislation? Call your elected officials and ask them to advocate and vote for it. Daughter feeling inferior? Introduce her to someone who can mentor her. Etc. It’s pretty simple. Doesn’t mean it’s easy, though. You’ll have to put in some effort.
Not at all encouraging to me
Andie,
I’m a historian and philosopher by nature. Therefore, I see things more from a systemic standpoint, not through the eyes of individual experiences. The problem with the enumerated personal experiences of yours is that there currently 7.3 billion people who all have personal experiences. Very few if any will change the world.
So reading about your personal experiences is fine. Okay, we know now that your raising wasn’t so traumatic and you seem to feel that women have made progress. Particularly so, that “at no time in (your) 60 years have (you) ever felt less than a man.”
And, I wish this was all about you. But it’s not. My comments are about the inhumanity to women that is a direct result of over 2000 years of a patriarchal society thriving on a mythology of man-worship that has cleaved this species to the point that we may never be united again. But it goes much deeper and darker than that.
Unfortunately, I live in a world of believers and I will never have the space and time to fully explain, much less undo, the harm that has been done to humanity and our planet by the Jukrislims.
Therefore, your reply is not at all encouraging to me, if anything, it is depressing to know that you did not get the point of what I was writing about.
Perhaps I should give up this philosophical prose and return to my creative writing where I can be in a world of my own making, behind four walls that I bring alive through my imagination. You “real world” people are really disappointing.
oh dear
I was trying to show that systemically things ARE moving (albeit interminably slowly) in the right direction, and that only by getting more and more people to experience what I was fortunate enough to experience will we get greater percentages of those 7.3 billion people to benefit. Was not all about me except as example and an attempt to encourage more people to be part of the change. Does your historian view not include seeing progress? You and I won’t see this totally solved in our lifetime, most likely, but are we helping or hindering progress?
And don’t worry, my parents screwed up in other areas, so I have cursed them often and spent decades in therapy, which is another whole topic altogether!! Life is good now (i.e. my ability to be happy in the midst of so many world crises) and I even miss my parents.
Statistically, aren’t more and more Americans moving away from “Jukrislim” and all organized religions?
And don’t you sort of enjoy being a curmudgeon? Or would you really like to be more optimistic and just don’t think reality allows it? I ask those in all seriousness because I am interested in knowing.
Don’t think it really works that way
I did mean to be clear that ‘all about you’ was by way of your example only. But one area where I disagree is when you say: “that only by getting more and more people to experience what I was fortunate enough to experience will we get greater percentages of those 7.3 billion people to benefit.”
I don’t think it really works that way. Most of those “7.3” live much of their life subjectively and will not be altogether that interested in individual experiences. Therefore, neither you nor I are “helping or hindering progress.”
Yes, more ‘young’ Americans (millennials) are moving away from organized religion and belief in god. Overall, in 2014 20% of Americans said they were not religious at all.
Unfortunately, 80 percent of Americans said they believe in an afterlife in 2014. Afterlife may seem like it’s a separate discussion but it is not. Afterlife is an indelible component of the Jukrislim mythology, particularly, the Christians…therefore, I do not subscribe to your makingprogress theory.
To answer your question “don’t you sort of enjoy being a curmudgeon? – etc…”
Not only do I not operate on a level of “curmudgeonly,” it’s more likely that I feel the pain of the past and present female holocaust greater than you and many other women I talk directly to about.
Moreover, my part of this discussion is not a test between optimism or negativism. I would think that fits more into your context of thinking.
Note that, except for a few times on a site like this, and rarely in person, do I discuss this topic on a one-to-one basis. I speak about and therefore, to, humanity as a whole, not individuals.
okay;
So I’m not sure what your goal/purpose is in posting on the topic, and I’m hoping to understand that. I have to admit when I read the original post, I said to myself, huh? Why did he post that? Certainly I agree that horrible, horrible atrocities have happened including/especially to women, in the name of religion (though I did not pick up on that from the first post). If I spend too much time dwelling on the atrocities, I become overwhelmed and unproductive. That’s why I put my energy into what feels to me more beneficial — working on solutions.
While I can be pretty sure you have much more specific factual knowledge than I, I do think I have a pretty good appreciation of/for the general essence of the collective terribleness of what has happened and continues to happen. I do not want to keep experiencing the pain, the rage, the fear. To what end would I or others do that? I want to experience forward movement. Perhaps you are hoping to open eyes of those not aware yet? And for what further purpose if any? Please help me understand your reason(s) for posting on this topic. I often feel so frustrated reading your posts because you seem to be seriously trying to say something important and I rarely get the point of it until I go through this back and forth with you. Perhaps I am a dolt, but I don’t like to think I am!
To be self-evident
If you don’t think you’re a dolt, don’t suggest that you are and don’t speak of it.
Andie, I write my articles to be self-evident. More often than not, feedback I get is that they are.
In this particular case, strangely, your comments keep weaving in and out by asking me questions and providing answers for me to confirm or not. I believe you when you say you’ve spent “decades” in therapy (for whatever reasons). That’s a very long time to seek answers.
I am not a therapist. But I will say that if you really do want to “experience forward movement” then my advice is move beyond this topic, because on a one-to-one basis, we could really get bogged down on this subject for years.
how ironic
Vidda, you suggest I move on! That’s the point I’ve been suggesting to you this whole thread — focus less on the delineation of the problem and work for change if the injustice, the travesty, etc., is so horrible in your understanding. It is the injustices, the travesty, etc. that energize me to take action.
My interest, my life work has always been about helping ALL people of whatever gender identification create something better. And I hope I never stop seeking understanding and answers, whether it is in my personal life or in more general applications.
I often do find your posts on ibrattleboro to be quite biting, bordering on mean-spirited in many cases, and directed very personally to do emotional harm, despite when people try to reach out and show you some respect, as I feel I have always tried to do. So, okay, I will not bother you further here or in other posts. I will look elsewhere for healthy exchanges.
Above and beyond
Andie, it’s been a long time seen I’ve heard this kind of abuse. I was hoping we all were beyond that.
Bravo.
Clap Clap Clap.
Good show Vidda. I must say you’ve done it again. Good show man.
In your quest to antagonize those of religious faiths you’ve actually pissed off someone who doesn’t even follow a particular religious institution.
The bigger picture
Gee thanks, mr. mike, for jumping in to try and define my objective (my quest?).
You should try to follow along. As I indicated to Andie, I don’t have a personal (one-to-one) rile with any particular person, no matter what “faith” they follow, or not.
It’s the bigger picture, mike, the bigger picture is the female holocaust.
All those actions are well and good
but not enough unfortunately. As we can see. Women have to adapt to a system that was designed exclusively by males. Before the sexual revolution of the 1960’s, women didn’t write the laws, indeed women were not even allowed to read and write. How many women wrote the Constitution or even consulted on it? The framers based the Constitution on the Iroquois Indian framework. But! And this is a big but – they left out the most important part – the women’s council. The women in the Iroquois tribes owned everything except the men’s clothing and tools. There was also a men’s council which women couldn’t sit on, but women had the power to appoint and depose the men on the council. The women could withhold supplies if they didn’t approve of a journey the men planned to take. The children were named from the women’s side.
Men denied women an education until relatively recently. In some countries this still applies. I’ve never heard of women doing that to men, have yoo? And men overall are more violent than women – ever seen a woman shooting into a crowd indiscriminately like we hear of so often these days in particular? What about women armies? Strangely women have been prohibited from being educated but there are no prohibitions on using weapons. Women just don’t go that way. Some do, but it’s a matter of degree. One cannot deny an argument because there are a few exceptions that break the generalization. Generalizations are applicable if they are true in 80% or more of the cases. We use generalizations all the time, imagine if we had to qualify exactly, every time we spoke. That would be tedious and long winded. Generalizations are helpful because they enable us to think quickly. That is not to mean they apply every time. And we live in a fast-paced world now, we have to know how to think nimbly.
Take any kind of power structure – secret societies, the UN, the IMF, the World Bank, Bohemian Grove, the Bildeberg Group, the Council on Foreign Relations…I could go on. But I think it’s pretty obvious by now. They are all overwhelmingly inhabited by men, some of them exclusively. Many times the women that enter these domains are hand picked by, you got it…
We keep on perpetrating the same old, same old, generation after generation.
So best thing for women (who are half or more of the population) to do is to draft our own Constitution. Women need to come forward now and not hide behind their man. Yep, men have pretty much single-handedly brought humanity to the brink of extinction and we’re going to have to clean up the mess. Hopefully with men supporting us, women will come to the fore and put some sense back into the world. This would be better for men as well as women because women don’t have the same tendencies and overall prefer to share with men.
We should be talking about what kind of a world we want to have and then we should go about designing the systems that achieve our highest ideals. Why compromise on those? A system is created to facilitate ease, not make us into automatons secondary to procedure. The existing systems restrain us. We need new systems and it’s not rocket science. Now that we have the internet, we can hold polls or internet surveys to find out exactly what people’s opinions are. That is true democracy. Why are we still doing things the old way, the way men a few hundred years ago dictated? Women, with the support of good men, can reconfigure life on earth to embrace all living things and strive for equality of opportunity.
The Second Sex Revisited
It occurred to me one day that just as women are the second (read, inferior) sex, all things associated with the feminine are also secondary and inferior. Academia is very prone to this.
Here are some examples of disciplines associated with the feminine: art, music, dance, poetry, fiction, literature in general, “the humanities,” psychology, sociology, education, languages, anthropology, theology, philosophy.
Here are some masculine discipines: all the “hard” sciences, chemistry, physics, medicine, engineering, mathematics,technology, law, business, finance, and to a lesser extent, history, political science, journalism.
Which ones do we value more as a society? Which ones do we think are better?
In education today, it’s all about STEM. Forget, art, music, languages, literature…. So I think modern America has chosen. Which is too bad for people who don’t fit into that one sided paradigm of what the future job market is going to look like. Is this carved in stone? Does it have to be this way, because if so, what a drag for everyone. We may as well be robots.
But I digress. The semiotics of sexism is subtle (said the serpent) and you find yourself ensnared in its memes without even realizing it. The language of the book of Genesis is straightforward enough, but when you get to how you feel about things based on the way you’ve been conditioned by society to think and believe, that’s much harder to unravel. When everything tells you that feminine is “less good” and sometimes superfluous, you have to ask yourself why? if you ask the question at all.
The misogynist Jukrislim death culture
” When everything tells you that feminine is “less good” and sometimes superfluous, you have to ask yourself why? if you ask the question at all.”
Now we’re getting somewhere. Thank you, Lise.
Genesis is an intentional, deadly serious male diatribe against women. In fact, you can see it as the beginning of the misogynist Jukrislim death culture we’ve been living with these past several thousand years.
Vidda, im glad that Lise was
Vidda, im glad that Lise was able to get this back on topic. The concept of an ongoing “Jurislim” female holocaust is not something most ordinary would think about. Thanks for raising the awareness bar.