Wednesday's Words for October 25, 2017

Autumn is definitely in full swing here in Southern Ontario. The good news is that our walnut tree has finally dropped practically all of its leaves. The bad news? There was a bumper crop of walnuts this year, and about half of them are still up there!

Calm days aren’t so bad. Windy days? Friends, we are living in a war zone! Those little bombs make a bang when they hit the roof on their way to the ground. Those that are on the road make a loud pop when run over by a vehicle. If it’s windy, and you have to go out the front door? You pray to be spared a walnut bomb on the noggin.

War, as they say, is hell.

As we all know, there is more than one kind of war being waged in our society these days. There was a war on poverty once, though anymore it looks like it’s morphed from an effort to ease the suffering of those afflicted by it, to an effort to simply make the lives of those afflicted harder and crueler. There’s a war on drugs, but I have no idea if we’re winning or losing that one.

People who identify along different places of the political spectrum seem to be at war, as well, and with each other, at that! That is a sad, sad state of affairs. Really, isn’t that war not much unlike the controversy between the over/under proponents on the best way to hang toilet paper?

And then there’s another war going on, one that did in fact begin raging long before I was ever born. This war I call the forgotten war. There have been moments during my life time, when it’s suddenly in the spotlight. And every time that happens, hell, I think we end up going backwards a couple of steps, instead of making progress.

That war, of course, is the one that nearly every woman alive on this entire freaking planet is aware of and even familiar with. It is a war being fought in classrooms, and courtrooms; in Hollywood, and New York. It is a war that is waged in restaurants and boardrooms, in factories and everywhere else that people—female people—work or live.

It’s a war for respect, for equality, and for the right not to be harassed, not to be touched, not to be ridiculed or made to hear rude, sexist comments. It’s a war for the right not to be raped.

Every time this war is in the spotlight, as happened most recently a few weeks ago when the New York Times published their story on Harvey Weinstein, people are all, “this is so shameful, disgusting, sick, despicable…” if you can think of a really powerful insult, it was likely hurled by someone to describe the now publicly shamed producer and what he’s accused of doing.

That’s always the first thing that happens after the spotlight has been turned on.

The next thing occurs when it becomes clear that no one is ripping to shreds the brave women who finally stood up and said “enough!”. That next thing is that more and more women dare to step forward. This time, though someone told me the hashtag is reborn and not new, the #metoo campaign exploded and yes, I published my own “metoo” post on my Face Book wall.

And then the next thing that happens is the flood of comments by many, intoned with various tones of sobriety or hope, that maybe women will now finally be “empowered” to stand up for themselves…and this is where I really, really have a problem.

Since the Council of Nicaea in AD 325 (pretty close to the beginning of recorded history) when the wise leaders of the new Christian faith tried to decide if women were beasts or human (human won, likely mainly because the Bible pretty much forbids bestiality), up to today, this war has been fought, women have stood up—and pretty much been beaten right back down again because of it. Ridiculed, humiliated, and often punished because they dared to complain, or dared to have been the victims of harassment, verbal abuse, or rape in the first place.

This time, I heard one commentator ask the right question: what causes this despicable thing to happen? I can’t recall the exact answer given at the time, but it was the wrong answer. Here’s the right one, and it’s not complicated.

The cause of this harassment is bad, inappropriate, an unacceptable behavior by some men. Period.

What’s needed to end it, is not simply for women to stand up, to speak out, because we have been doing that for all of our lives.

What’s needed is for good, decent men to stand up with us, to speak out, and let it be known that this behavior is not to be tolerated anymore. It is not right, and it should end, now. That is the only way things are going to change. Women can not do it alone. Good, decent men have to help.

I do believe, with all my heart, that there are plenty of good, decent men available to get the job done.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury