Life and Politics
Whether we like
it or not, everything in life is political. Your
choices in life are influenced by your political
views. How you are seen by others is dependent on
their politics. Even being a-political is a political
statement. I have a few thoughts on the current
political climate in the world. I'd be happy to share
them with you, if you're interested.
If not, don't let me bore you! Just use your back
button, and go on to something else! Politics and Religion Today's resurgence of ultra-orthodoxy in
religion coincides with the growth of
ultra-conservatism in politics. This trend is
world-wide.
It needs to be understood as a backlash against the
women's rights movement on the political level as
well as the renewed interest in women's spirituality.
The patriarchy will not simply go away without a
fight. Thus, we have the rise of the likes of Saddam
Hussein and Newt Gingrich. It may seem a stretch to
put these two in the same bed, so to speak, but it's
not. They represent both the religious and political
right, which has seized power in order to combat the
threat of women to the patriarchy.
Witness the brutalization of woman through
clitoridectomy and the general subjugation of women
in the Arab world;
Even the most despotic regimes realize that too long
a siege will dispirit and enrage the fair-minded, so
the pendulum must inevitably be allowed to swing back
in the other direction again, at least on the
political scene. And
So... The most brutal
dictators the world has ever known came to power in
times of economic prosperity and political
apathy. We are political beings whether we know it
or not. Silence speaks as eloquently as
activism. Political
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the continued denial of
woman-power and gay-power by the Pope (who
nevertheless wears a dress); along with the majority
of male-dominated church hierarchies;
the
resurgence of the battering of women among
ultra-orthodox Jews;
and the rise of the Promise
Keepers.
All of these phenomena have arisen to
challenge the emergence of women as a true
socio-political-economic force.
The religious right, however,
will hang on longer because it appeals more to the
mass hysteria and ignorance of non-ruling (i.e.
powerless) males, who, in their panic, find some
modicum of power in their religious fundamentalism.
They will let go of it only reluctantly, probably
not until the next generation rises to take the place
of the present one.
