It is a common misconception. What is sold as protection all too often turns out to be some form of slavery. Until the suffrage movement that began in the early part of the twentieth century, women were not included in the bill of rights. She was the property of her husband, as were any assets she could amass. As such if her partner chose to beat her, or have her committed to an insane asylum, or if he wanted to move her to some wilderness, with no roads or stores, or any modern amenity, she was stuck. Her property could be sold, without her knowledge. Keep that in mind, then include t he fact that there were few occupations at which a woman could ever hope to make a decent living.... then you might understand the need for the woman's movement. In some regions it was impossible for women to have a bank account of their own. And her husband or father could collect the paltry wages she could earn. All of that is the essence of NOT being free. With freedom and the vote, comes all the rights of citizenship. A woman can have a bank account, and may make deposits or withdrawals at will. She can look for a job, on the basis that she will be paid as an equal. She can enter into contracts... for housing, for services, for employment, what ever... that is her prerogative. She may also have control of her body, and her fertility. Much has been written about the lot of widows and orphans, but how much is known about their rights. In British (and American) law, the children were the property of the husband and the husband's family. In the event of his death the children could be claimed by the parents of the husband, and the wife could quite literally be left out in the cold. If no provision were made, or if the husband had not yet come into his inheritance, there was little she could do, and frequently had no right even to her dowry. It is so unfortunate that there are still women who confuse wealth and comfort for freedom. There is nothing in the Bill of Rights that guarantees any body anything of the sort.What the constitutons provide is the right to direct ones own life and that for better or for worse. What women can now look for in partnerships, is equality, and consideration of the value of their contribution to the economic relationship, even if they do not contribute cash. The contribution of an efficient housekeeper, homemaker should never have been devalued. How many of the 'captains of industry, would have advanced if they did not have someone to care for the home front , to ensure that nutritious meals are available on time, and that there will be clean clothes, and a hygeinic home (that won't make him sick) How far could a child be educated, if much time had to be spent on clothing and cooking etc. For so long what we think of as traditional womens work has been seriously undervalued. Yet when the need arrose, women have proven themselves very capable of taking over in such trivialties as food producers, (at the farm gate) as nurses of the sick and gravely ill, and in industrial productivity. And all with little or no payment of wages or salary. In fact when WW2 ended, women that had been involved in industry,,, some of it surprising, were summarily dismissed, so that their fathers brothers, and husbands and sons could find jobs, when they returned home. There were more than a few, who having lost their jobs discovered that the spouse suffered from some form of PTSD (shell shock) and became violent drunks. From that point on, their lot was poverty and misery, until the sixties, when they finally got a chance to get back on their feet.
On Jan 13, 8:04 am, "florida mike !" <[email protected]> wrote: > Women's Liberation Through Submission: An Evangelical Anti-Feminism > Is > Bornhttp://www.truthout.org/011209WA > This October, more than 6,000 women gathered in Chicago for the True > Woman Conference '08: a stadium-style event to promote what its > proponents call biblical womanhood, complementarianism, or - most > bluntly - the patriarchy movement. > > Women gathering to support the patriarchy movement? It's > evangelical counterculture at its most contrarian. > > The Associated Baptist Press explains the relationship of > biblical > womanhood to feminism, highlighting an ambitious initiative that > arose > from the meeting: a signature-drive seeking 100,000 women to endorse > its "True Woman Manifesto," which, the ABP writes, aims "at sparking > a > counter-revolution to the feminist movement of the 1960s." > > To outside observers of the patriarchy movement, the starkness of > the calls for gender hierarchy often seem amusingly outdated (not to > mention historically misleading: feminist blogs Feministing and > Pandagon have deftly dismantled some of the speakers' "Leave it to > Beaver" idealizations of the 1950s as a time when women were > universally protected). > > For the rest of Kathryn Joyce's exploration of evangelical anti- > feminism, please click here. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
