I spent yesterday in a beauty parlor. I rarely get an opportunity to do this, and so I relished every moment of the experience. The women that work in this particular salon are vibrant, bold, and free thinkers.
While I was getting my hair shampooed, the stylist starting telling me about how her step-daughter had been drawn into a "born-again" Christian community, which was difficult for her and her husband, who are both non-observant Jews. Being blessed (or cursed?) with my inquisitive mind, I asked her more questions about why her step-daughter was drawn into this sort of community.
The story is she was abandoned by her mother at a young age, and she has consequently grown up feeling wounded and vulnerable (who can blame her?). She has spent a great deal of time trying to find a place where she belonged, where she felt loved and buoyed up by a community. Then, in her early thirties, she got pregnant and her step-mother (my stylist for the day) encouraged her to get an abortion. She (the step-mother) was deeply concerned that she was not mentally capable of taking care of a child because she was so consumed by her own demons. Her step-daughter agreed with her and then had the abortion.
Soon after her decision to have an abortion, she became a "born again." This is, unfortunately, a common occurrence. According to my stylist, she was overwrought with guilt for a host of what she considered to be irresponsible decisions made. The guilt only added to her already profound sense of alientation and she longed to be "forgiven." And here is where the evangelical Christian communities can step in.
It seems that a great deal of "lost souls"--people broken and bruised by life--find themselves drawn to evagelicalism (the good news). One of my friends once explained to me that the reason evangelicals so relentlessly do missionary work is because they believe that they have a powerful cure, a healing balm, for the downtrodded. He made the analogy that it was like advertising a cure for cancer, if you had it.
When I was first in graduate school, I regularly bumped into these "missionaries" as I would leave campus. They would walk up to students who were walking alone, perhaps looking sad, shy or awkward and invite them to a bible study. I now see regular "recruiters" on the campus where I teach. There are two groups: the Campus Crusade for Christ and Intervarsity. When I go to grab coffee, I often see the "disciple makers" (yep, that's what they're called) sitting with students and praying, going over what sins or weaknesses the students experienced during the week (envy, lust, uncertainty of God, etc.).
The students that are drawn into these groups often seem to me to be outsiders, those who are perhaps really bright but a bit socially awkward. The social scence at my college can be quite brutal, and easily alienates the not-quite-cool student who then finds a loving, accepting community among fellow Christians.
I asked my stylist what made her step-dauther feel guilty? Had she deeply felt a wrong, that she had broken a moral law? Did she feel guilty because she had been irresponsible sexually? Did she feel guilty because she had grown up in a society that teaches women to see themselves as "guilty"? The stylist sort of thought about it and didn't really have an answer, which seems right to me.
I think that as feminists we need to seriously confront the lack of supportive communities available to women and men broken and bruised by life. We are excellent at pointing out the harms, rooting out sexism, and fighting for rights and legislation. But, we aren't always great at offering alternative communities for the women who find themselves defeated by life. While I think the activist women whom I hang out with are a great community, I don't know that many women out there know we are here. They might find us in the battered women's shelters, or other social service agencies. But, we aren't always easy to find. And, we don't go seeking them out, like the evangelical community does (which is probably a good thing).
What I think many of us yearn for, especially the many women I have met who have grown up thinking they deserved less from life, is a strong community that supports them. And, we should be able to offer up a community that doesn't demand the insane "social contract" with evangelical communities: anti-homosexuality, anti-women's rights, pro-patriarchy, etc. We too should be having "pot-lucks," sharing childcare responsibilities, visiting our the sick in hospitals, etc. And, don't get me wrong, many many feminist communities do.
But, when I think about what the mainstream world offers as solutions to the deep sense of alienation felt by a great many of us I am not surprised that the evangelicals can be so attractive. We offer therapy, antidepressants, anti-anxiety medications, sleeping pills or, for the more adventurous, there are yoga classes, crystal healings, etc. We are all looking for a place to belong, a place that buoys us up.
I think that feminists need to tend to wounded souls--to the broken spirits of women victims of abuse or drug addiction. If we don't do this, if we don't empathize with the anguish of women, like my stylist's step-daughter, who feels guilty, then we do risk losing these women to a movement that promises order, moral rectititude, and absolutes.
I agree with you that supportive communities can be hard to find outside the religious variety, particularly because church has be exactly what served this social service in European culture for so very long (certainly since the Middle Ages, no?). And of course, the communes of the 1960s were trying to address exactly what you talk about, community without the social contract of hating the other. Of course, that's easier to say than to achieve. There is something so naturally tempting to human beings when they get together with like-minded people, to start trashing the "other" --the homosexual, the secularist, the capitalist, the conventional, the meat-eater, etc. etc. etc. It's so easy to go from community to collectivity to mob. How do we provide the support without demanding an identity of values and truths? I've got no answer, but it surely does seem to be a problem!
ReplyDeleteI--
ReplyDeleteThat explains alot. It also helps me pinpoint why I really hated David Brooks' op-ed yesterday. He basically argues that those experiments in living during the sixties were "stupid ideas," and the country is becoming more virtuous now (his evidence is that women are being beaten less) because we are returning to traditional values! Barf!
No credit given to the feminists who have brought awareness to violence against women, eh?
Part of the issue is that the proabortion crowd cares more about the actual abortion than the woman or girl having it. You all illustrate this point very nicely by admitting that the proabortion groups do nothing to support these women after they have their abortions and then you say that it's "unfortunate" (a point you made in a previous posting as well) that religious groups are helping them to cope with their loss or sense of guilt about the decision they may have made recently or years ago. "IF" women actually receive any counseling before having an abortion does someone tell them in detail about what they are carrying? Do they see an ultrasound or given any idea about the development stage of the child within? Are they counseled that someday the pain and regret of their decision may be overwhelmeing?... or are they told just relax it'll be all over soon, you're doing the right thing and you'll be able to get on with your life? The answer appears to be more in tune with the latter. Everytime "informed consent" laws or "24 hour waiting period" laws are proposed the pro abortion groups go nuts. If they really cared about the woman they would want her to make as informed a decision as is possible. Do any of these abortion advocacy organizations offer post abortion counselling? Would any of these "prochoice" groups do anything to help a woman who might want to keep her baby instead of aborting it? That would be a prochoice decision. The answers are "no" because it's not about the person it's about the procedure.
ReplyDeleteSo you act like these religious groups are exploiting these women in their attempts to aid them in their emotional, physical, and yes spiritual healing. I guess many people on your side of the issue don't see any need for healing since as far as they're concerned the women were cured when they had their abortions. The real exploiters are those who facilitated those abortions for their own gain leaving the women to work out the after effects on their own.
"i" said,
"How do we provide the support without demanding an identity of values and truths? I've got no answer,..."
"i" has no answer because the answer is you can't.
Aspazia, I will give you credit for acknowledging that this is a problem but the way you put it now and prevously, it's a problem because it reflects poorly on the "prochoice" movement.
Some states require that women considering an abortion be advised of all the medical risks that such a procedure subjects them to. I wonder if they should also be warned that having an abortion may cause you to be born again. That might do more than anything else to reduce the number of abortions in this country!
ReplyDeleteDear Anonymous (Warning, this is long):
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, let me thank you for posting and engaging me in dialogue about this issue.
Now, let me tackle two points you make.
First of all, you suggest that family planning clinics do not offer pre and post-abortion counseling. Unfortunately, that is simply not true. You might find reading about the history of clinics interesting on this subject, as well as visiting a clinic or speaking with a clinic worker. I can't say for certain that hospitals provide the counseling you describe, but low-income women are less likely to seek out hospital abortions anyway.
You might also find it interesting to know that before the repeal of the anti-abortion laws in place in this country, one of the most prominent referral and counseling services for women desperate to get abortions was provided by Clergy. Look up information on Rev. Moody. Not all churches and religious leaders agree with your anti-abortion views. Predominantly the Catholic church and fundamentalists Jews and Christians do. The Catholic Church, however, is one of the large tax-exempt lobbyist organizations and uses its money and pulpits to organize parishoners to fight legal abortion.
Now, to my second point. I will give you one reason why I fear that certain religious organizations are best suited to counsel women after abortions. The early fathers of the Catholic Church (Augustine, Tertullian and Aquinas) authored treatises that claimed that women were "guilty" upon birth. They were responsible for tempting men away from more noble pursuits, they were less-perfect men, less capable than men, and essentially made in the wicked image of Eve. With these sorts of foundational texts, why would any woman find comfort from traditional Catholics. The Protestant church fathers--Calvin or Luther, for example, had no higher opinion of women either.
If you want an example of what I am talking about, consider St. Thomas Aquinas' treatise "The Production of Woman" (From the Summa Theologica) The Production of Woman. Here is a sample of what he wrote:
Whether the woman should have been made in the first production of things?
Objection 1. It would seem that the woman should not have been made in the first production of things. For the Philosopher says (De Gener. ii, 3), that "the female is a misbegotten male." But nothing misbegotten or defective should have been in the first production of things. Therefore woman should not have been made at that first production.
Objection 2. Further, subjection and limitation were a result of sin, for to the woman was it said after sin (Gn. 3:16): "Thou shalt be under the man's power"; and Gregory says that, "Where there is no sin, there is no inequality." But woman is naturally of less strength and dignity than man; "for the agent is always more honorable than the patient," as Augustine says (Gen. ad lit. xii, 16). Therefore woman should not have been made in the first production of things before sin.
Objection 3. Further, occasions of sin should be cut off. But God foresaw that the woman would be an occasion of sin to man. Therefore He should not have made woman.
On the contrary, It is written (Gn. 2:18): "It is not good for man to be alone; let us make him a helper like to himself."
I answer that, It was necessary for woman to be made, as the Scripture says, as a "helper" to man; not, indeed, as a helpmate in other works, as some say, since man can be more efficiently helped by another man in other works; but as a helper in the work of generation. This can be made clear if we observe the mode of generation carried out in various living things. Some living things do not possess in themselves the power of generation, but are generated by some other specific agent, such as some plants and animals by the influence of the heavenly bodies, from some fitting matter and not from seed: others possess the active and passive generative power together; as we see in plants which are generated from seed; for the noblest vital function in plants is generation. Wherefore we observe that in these the active power of generation invariably accompanies the passive power. Among perfect animals the active power of generation belongs to the male sex, and the passive power to the female. And as among animals there is a vital operation nobler than generation, to which their life is principally directed; therefore the male sex is not found in continual union with the female in perfect animals, but only at the time of coition; so that we may consider that by this means the male and female are one, as in plants they are always united; although in some cases one of them preponderates, and in some the other. But man is yet further ordered to a still nobler vital action, and that is intellectual operation. Therefore there was greater reason for the distinction of these two forces in man; so that the female should be produced separately from the male; although they are carnally united for generation. Therefore directly after the formation of woman, it was said: "And they shall be two in one flesh" (Gn. 2:24).
Reply to Objection 1. As regards the individual nature, woman is defective and misbegotten, for the active force in the male seed tends to the production of a perfect likeness in the masculine sex; while the production of woman comes from defect in the active force or from some material indisposition, or even from some external influence; such as that of a south wind, which is moist, as the Philosopher observes (De Gener. Animal. iv, 2). On the other hand, as regards human nature in general, woman is not misbegotten, but is included in nature's intention as directed to the work of generation. Now the general intention of nature depends on God, Who is the universal Author of nature. Therefore, in producing nature, God formed not only the male but also the female.
Reply to Objection 2. Subjection is twofold. One is servile, by virtue of which a superior makes use of a subject for his own benefit; and this kind of subjection began after sin. There is another kind of subjection which is called economic or civil, whereby the superior makes use of his subjects for their own benefit and good; and this kind of subjection existed even before sin. For good order would have been wanting in the human family if some were not governed by others wiser than themselves. So by such a kind of subjection woman is naturally subject to man, because in man the discretion of reason predominates. Nor is inequality among men excluded by the state of innocence, as we shall prove (96, 3).
Reply to Objection 3. If God had deprived the world of all those things which proved an occasion of sin, the universe would have been imperfect. Nor was it fitting for the common good to be destroyed in order that individual evil might be avoided; especially as God is so powerful that He can direct any evil to a good end.
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So, Anonymous, we simply disagree that fundamentalists are the answer, the healing balm for broken and bruised women. In fact, I would go further and argue that we should consider them responsible, in part, for an ideology that teaches women to hate themselves.
Hey Maynard,
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful stump speech for someone like Casey, Jr.
--Aspazia