Nurturing the Nations Reclaiming the Dignity of Women in Building Healthy Cultures

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Nurturing the Nations Reclaiming the Dignity of
Women in Building Healthy Cultures

• The Culture of Sexism

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Part 2 THE LIE ROOT OF THE POVERTY

• 3 The Framework
• 4 The Crushing of Women
• 5 The Culture of Sexism
• 6 The Disappearance of Women

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Questions

• Why is it that there are 100,000,000 dead women?
• What is the root of mens emotional or physical
  abuse, or even brutalizing women?
• Why are women treated as property, as inferior to
  men?

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One of the greatest causes of poverty in the
world is a lie!

• The lie
• Men are superior to women!

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The Lie is Manifest in the Social Order

• The Crushing of Women
• Based on Atomisms Sexism
• Men and women are different and men are superior
  to women
• Women by nature are inferior to men

• The Disappearance of Women
• Based on Monisms Feminism
• Men and women are equal, therefore they are the
  same
• Women are equal to men when they act like men

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Outline

• Machismo
• African Traditional Religions
• Hinduism
• Buddhism
• Islam
• Confucianism
• The Unheeding Church

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Machismo
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Macho

• Macho simply means male.
• Machismos culture values virility - a mans
  ability to procreate, not to husband or father.
• Machismo is about power of men over women.

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bien gallo

• Being macho is considered synonymous with
  being a wife-beater, a philanderer, a drunk, a
  bien gallo a fighter, like a rooster.

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Mariology

• Roman Catholicism venerated the Virgin Mary as
  The Mother of God.
• The simple Jewish peasant girl becomes the Queen
  of Heaven.
• Approaching a quadrian view of God as Father,
  Son, Holy Spirit, and the Virgin Mary.

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Virgin Mary
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The Perpetual Virgin

• As the Virgin Mother, Mary of church
  tradition remains a virgin forever, untouched by
  the passion of sex. This symbol of perpetual
  virginity points to the dangers of female
  sexuality. the perpetual Virgin Mother of
  church tradition denies the reality of womens
  entire embodied life as good and spiritually
  significant. Lilian Calles Barger
• Eves Revenge

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Three Types of Women

• Las buenas mujeres good women who spends
  her days in the kitchen
• Mujeres renegades embittered women like
  Catholic nuns who denied their womanhood
• Mujeres pintadas painted women who were
  women of questionable reputations

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The Distant Father The Close Mother

• Latinos tend to portray Christ as dead and
  dying, yet Mary is radiant and beautiful. God is
  viewed as very distant (just like Latin fathers),
  but Mary is close, carrying, and always ready to
  intercede for Gods children (just like Latin
  mothers).
• Joel Comiskey
• Missionary

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Machismo Cannot Exist Without Marianismo
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African Traditional Religions
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African Sayings

• The man is an axe he can cut as many trees as
  he wants.
• Men graze widely!
• Real men beat their wives!

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Women as Property

• The image of the woman in most African
  societies is that of a human being to be
  exploited for the benefit of the man. Women pass
  for wives, mothers, farmers, cooks, drawers of
  water and hewers of wood.
• Rev. Karimu Damap
• Editor of the RURCON

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Hinduism

• The god ganesha

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Hinduism Sacred Text the Puranas

• Let a woman who wishes to perform sacred
  oblations wash the feet of her lord and drink the
  water, for her husband is her lord, her priest,
  her religion. Wherefore abandoning all else she
  ought to chiefly worship her husband.

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Legitimized Genocide of Women

• These religions clearly and unambiguously
  justify and prescribe the crushing of women to
  the status of sub-humans. Rather than being due
  to some kind of corruption, the ghastly
  practices of sati, female infanticide, dowry and
  related acts are actually enforced by Vedic and
  Hindu scriptures. these religions, and nothing
  else are the main culprits behind the most
  anti-woman system the world has ever seen.
  Indeed, Brahminism is nothing but the legitimized
  genocide of women.

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A SongMourning the Birth of a Girl

• On my birth there was no singing
• But sadness filled the air,
• No people came to visit
• To bless or to give child care
• Kill her, Kill her, Kill her,
• Was what my father said
• A world wide declaration
• Because I was a girl.

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Poem The Sixth Finger

• I hang there,
• Limp,
• Shriveled,
• Not Needed.
• An embarrassment to the owner,
• An object of ridicule for others.

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Poem The Sixth Finger

• A lump of flesh,
• A deformity,
• Ugly,
• Cut it off!
• How helpless,
• And yet
• How true.
• Do you want to meet me?
• I am the sixth finger!
• Grace

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Results of Hindu Belief

• Sex Selection Abortions
• Female Infanticide
• Child Bride
• Disfigurement
• Dowry Death
• Kitchen Accidents

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The Vedic Roots of Sex Selection Abortions and
Female Infanticide

• Atharva Veda, 6.2.3 Let a female child be born
  somewhere else here, let a male child be born.
• Taittirya Sambita VI.5.10.3 Hence they Aryans
  reject a female child when born, and take up a
  male.

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Female Infanticide

• This annihilation of 50 million children,
  most by violent means after childbirth, has
  occurred during the last 50 years of Indias
  Independence, and confirms the estimate of 1
  million girls murdered by Brahmins each year for
  the last 50 years. It is to be noted that Hitler,
  one of the greatest mass murderers of all times,
  exterminated only 5 million Jews. The Brahmin
  mass murder of 50 million female children in the
  20th century has thus been TEN TIMES more severe
  than the Jewish Holocaust. And the killing
  continues.

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Child Marriage

• Lawbooks sic prescribe that the best partner
  for a man is one-third his age.1
• Manu.IX.94 a man, aged thirty years, shall
  marry a maiden of twelve who pleases him, or a
  man of twenty-four a girl of eight years of age
  if (the performance of) his duties would
  otherwise be impeded, he must marry sooner.2

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Roots of Disfigurement

• Lord Rama practiced the savage cutting
  off of womens noses for minor offenses, thereby
  providing divine sanction for this sadistic
  custom. In the Ramayana, Shurpanakha is described
  as a black Dravidian lady who fell in love with
  Rama. She proposed marriage to him, but he
  refused her, directing her to his brother Laxman.
  This pious Hindu god immediately cut off her ears
  and nose for the crime of daring to propose to
  him. The mighty Rama fully condoned this cruel
  act.

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Roots of Widow Burning A Sati Hymn

• Rig Veda X.18.7 Let these women, whose
  husbands are worthy and are living, enter the
  house with ghee (applied) as corrylium (to their
  eyes). Let these wives first step into the pyre,
  tearless without any affliction and well
  adorned.

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Roots of SatiThe Rig Veda

• Garuda.Purana.II.4.91-100 states that if a woman
  does not perform sati, she will be continually
  reborn in the lowly body of a woman until she
  does.
• In contrast, Daksa Smrti IV.18-19 states that a
  woman who performs sati on her husbands funeral
  pyre will have eternal bliss in heaven.

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Buddhism
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Religious Orders

• Bhikkus Order for monks
• Bhikkunis Order for nuns

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Buddhas Teaching on Women

• You should know that when men have close
  relationships with women, they have close
  relationships with evil ways
• Fools lust for women like dogs in heat..
• Women can ruin the precepts of purity.
• They can also ignore honor and virtue.
• Causing one to go to hell, they prevent rebirth
  in heaven.
• Why should a wise delight in them?

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Dialog with the Buddha

• Ananda How are we to conduct ourselves, Lord,
  with regard to womankind?
• Buddha As not seeing them, Ananda.
• Ananda But if we should see them, what should
  we do?
• Buddha No talking, Ananda.
• Ananda But if they should speak to us, Lord,
  what are we to do?
• Buddha Keep wide awake, Ananda.

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Popular Sayings

• Burmese Males are much nobler than females so
  much so that a male dog is nobler than a female
  human.1
• Thailand Men are the front legs of the
  elephant, women are the back legs.2

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Body-Spirit Dualism

• Buddha taught and practiced asceticism
• Goal of Buddhism Nirvana liberation from this
  world
• Monks taught to have an esthetic hatred of the
  female body
• Monks are encouraged to meditate upon a woman
  as bags of skin filled with bile, impure blood,
  pus and viscera.1

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Karma and Rebirth

• Karma - the law of cause and effect
• Samsara - reincarnation

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The Path to Nirvana is Male

• A devout Buddhist womans prayer
• I pray that I may be reborn as a male in a
  future existence.1
• The Queen Mother of Thailand
• By power of my merit, may I be reborn a
  male.2

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Sex Trade and Tourism

• Thai population of 60 M people
• 600,000 Thai women are prostitutes
• Forty percent of these were forced into the
  trade.
• The industry brings in 12 15 billion a year
  and contributes between 2.9 - 3.6 of Thailands
  GDP.1

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Islam
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Islam is Deeply Anti-woman.

• Islam has always considered women as
  creatures as inferior in every way physically,
  intellectually, and morally. This negative vision
  is divinely sanctioned in the Koran, corroborated
  by the hadiths all that is narrated from the
  Prophet, and perpetuated by the commentaries of
  the theologians, the custodians of Muslim dogma
  and ignorance.
• Ibn Warraq
• Islams Shame

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Islams View of Women

• The Koran states Your women are a tilth for you
  (to cultivate). So go to your tilth as ye will
  (2223).
• The Prophet Mohammed said The woman is a toy,
  whoever takes her let him care for her.

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Men are in Charge of Women

• Men are in charge of women, because Allah
  hath made the one of them to excel the other, and
  because they spend of their property (for the
  support of women). So good women are the
  obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah
  hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear
  rebellion, admonish them and brandish them to
  beds apart, and scourge them (434).

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The Birth of a Son

• Certainly, desire for male children is common
  in much of the world, but no place can compare
  with Arab lands, where every woman must endure
  boiling tension throughout her childbearing
  years, waiting for the birth of a son. Sons are
  the sole reason for marriage, the key to
  satisfaction for the husband.
• Princess Sultana
• Royal House of Saud

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Islamic Shariah Law

• and remain in your house, and do not go about
  displaying your fineries as women used to do in
  the days of ignorance (3333).
• they should not stamp the ground in walking so
  as to reveal their hidden decorations (ornaments,
  etc., by their jingle) (2431).
• do not talk in a soft voice, lest the man of
  the unhealthy heart should cherish false hopes
  from you (3332).

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Islamic Sayings

• Bengal Proverb Wifes heaven is under the
  husbands feet.
• The Prophet "Hang up your whip where your wife
  can see it." 1

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The Irony
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The Burka

• Questions What does this reveal about
• women?
• men?
• Islamic concept of morality?

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Confucianism
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Confucianism Establishes a Social Hierarchy

• Father/Son - filial piety
• Ruler/Subject - loyalty
• Elder Brother/Younger Brother - superiority of
  the elder, wiser brother
• Husband/Wife - segregation and male superiority
• Friend/Friend - mutual trust

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Three Elements Establishing Male Superiority

• The Korean phrase - namjon yobi
• Three Tenets of Obedience - samjong
• The Seven Evils for Expelling a Wife - chilgo

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The Korean phrase - namjon yobi

• The phrase that all Korean children learn as they
  learn the Korean language
• It means elevation of men and subjection of
  women
• It is translated
• men high, women low
• men are honored, women are despised
• Founded on the myth of the bear

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Three Tenets of Obedience - samjong

• Obedience to her father before she is married
• Obedience to her husband in marriage
• Obedience to her eldest son after the death of
  her husband

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The Seven Evils for Expelling a Wife - chilgo

• Disobedience to the parents-in-laws
• Inability to bear a male son
• Adultery
• Jealousy
• Having an incurable disease
• Talkativeness
• Stealing

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Neo-Confucian Sayings1

• Womans greatest duty is to produce a son.
• A woman ruler is like a hen crowing.
• Disorder is not sent down by Heaven, it is
  produced by women.
• Those who cannot be taught, cannot be
  instructed. These are women and eunuchs.

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JeJu Museum Exhibit

• "It is better to be born a cow than a woman"

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The Social Consequences

• In 2002, for every 100 girls born in China, 117
  boys were born.
• By the year 2020 there will be 40 million more
  men in China than women.1

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The Unheeding Church
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Accommodating the Culture

• Sexism
• Historic Church
• Church in developing world
• The Crushing of Women
• Feminism
• Modern world
• Reaction to Sexism
• The Disappearance of Women

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It All Began with Plato

• God made the soul in origin and excellence
  prior to and older than the body, to be ruler and
  mistress, of whom the body was subject.
• Plato
• Timaeus

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The Consequences for Sex and Women

• Sexuality
• Evil
• For procreation
• Holiness through celibacy
• Role of Women
• Primary role procreation
• Woman and her body are fundamentally evil
• For a woman to have significance desexed

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The Greek Dichotomy

• Mind
• Reason
• Spirit
• Soul
• Ruling

Superior
SPIRITUAL
MALE

• Body
• Flesh
• Sex
• Reproduction
• Domesticity

Inferior
FEMALE
PHYSICAL
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Tertullian (160-225 A.D.) of Carthage

• You are the devils gateway you are the
  unsealer of that (forbidden) tree you are she
  who persuaded him whom the devil was not valiant
  enough to attack. You destroyed so easily Gods
  image, man. On account of your desert that is,
  death even the Son of God had to die.

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Origen (185-254 A.D.) of Alexandria

• What is seen with the eyes of the creator is
  masculine, and not feminine, for God does not
  stoop to look upon what is feminine and of the
  flesh.

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Epiphanius (315-403 A.D.) Bishop of Cyprus

• For the female sex is
• easily seduced, weak,
• and without much
• understanding. The
• devil seeks to vomit
• out this disorder
• through women.

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Ambrose (339-397 A.D.)Bishop of Milan

• Whoever does not believe is a woman,
  and she is still addressed with her physical
  sexual designation for the woman who believes is
  elevated to male completeness and to a measure or
  the stature of the fullness of Christ .

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Jerome (342-420 A.D.) Patriarch of
Constantinople

• Assigned spiritual values to women a hundred
  for virgins, sixty for widows, and thirty for
  married women, ranking marriage just above
  fornication.

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Jerome (342-420 A.D.) Patriarch of
Constantinople

• As long as woman is for birth and
  children, she is different from man as body from
  soul. But when she wishes to serve Christ more
  than the world, then she will cease to be a woman
  and will be called man (vir).

• What are the implications of this for woman?
• How has this impacted the Catholic Church?
• How has this influenced women in Protestant
  churches today?

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Augustine (354-430 A.D.)Bishop of Hippo

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Augustine (354-430 A.D.)Bishop of Hippo

• when I was treating of the nature of the
  human
• mind, that the woman, together with her own
• husband, is the image of God, to that the whole
• substance may be one image but when she is
• referred to separately in her quality as a
  helpmeet,
• which alone, then she is not the image of God,
  but
• as regards the man alone, he is the image of God
• as fully and completely as when the woman too is
• joined with him in one.

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Where is the glorying and wonder of women to be
found?