Greetings to you all.
Hopefully you are well and enjoying the summer. As always, many weddings have come and gone this
season and more will follow. For now though, I must discuss an unfortunate wedding-related
event that recently consumed my thoughts: chauvinism.
Let me set the scene:
A young woman and her mother sit close together planning the
twenty-two year old’s wedding which will happen in about a month. Much to accomplish on the pre-wedding to-do
list for these two women who busily attend to each item on the list. As they discuss the decorations and the menu
and the song list, the mother lovingly offers this pearl of marital wisdom to
her daughter:
“Honey, when you marry you will
follow your husband’s family’s set of traditions. On holidays, you will go to his family or you
will follow their traditions in your own home. When I married your father, we celebrated with
his family as you know. It wasn’t until
your father’s parents both passed that we spent a holiday with my parents. This is what you will do when you marry.”
I cannot express to you my outrage and my disbelief upon
hearing this true to life story happening in today’s world. First of all, why does the husband’s family
tradition take priority? In a marriage,
the two people should decide together what their plans will be. Saying that the woman should submit to the
man’s way of doing things cuts off any discussion or relationship building
between these two young people. It
deepens the notion that men rule the household and women have no authority or
voice beyond what the man grants.
Secondly, just because the mom decided in her marriage to handle it this
way does not mean that the daughter should follow. Now, if the bride-to-be and husband-to-be
decide together that this is how their marriage should be, then I cannot argue
that because they made that decision together.
I think it’s wrong and I think it’s harmful to them as well as to any
children who are then raised in this belief, but it thankfully is not my
marriage. Despite the fact that I believe
in a couple’s right to live with this marital structure, perpetuating this kind
of chauvinism in families does little to move us forward as a land of equality.
Now what does this have to do with Wicca or paganism? Well, the above situation transpired between
a devoutly Catholic mother and her daughter.
No surprise that chauvinism would be present in this family since their
religion teaches gender hierarchy through excluding women from being priests
and the recent attack on American nuns, right?
They also have a creation myth based on the idea that women are the
reason humans fell from grace. This isn’t
a harsh on Catholics post, so I will stop there, but it is necessary to
understand the full situation so we can then look at the pagan perspective in
comparison.
In Wicca, the Lord and the Lady are frequently seen as equals. In some popular creation myths, the Lady
comes first and when the Lord shows up in the plot, there’s no shame or guilt
or fall from grace to support either gender being superior. The Lord and Lady each see to different
elements of life on earth. They walk in
love sharing this world in a beautiful balance.
Their relationship myth shows a respect for one another and a unity of
purpose for their life together. Under
this model for marriage each participant is valued and appreciated. The married couple moves through life
mutually choosing celebrations and traditions as a couple. As a couple they discuss, they create, and at
times they argue, but they build a life together based on mutual esteem and
love. Neither party makes the other feel
lesser or like his/her opinions have no merit because the other party has
superiority or dominion over the other.
This is what the Wiccan creation myth teaches about
marriage. It is beautiful. It is respect. It is divinely inspired unity.
Therefore why on earth would anyone ever willingly give up
his/her own self-determination just because he/she got married? That makes no sense to me whatsoever. It seems to demean the beauty of
marriage. It reduces the woman to
chattel that live in the father’s home for so long and then get traded to the
husband. If that’s not just backwards thinking I don’t know what is. Frankly, I
want no part of it. Thankfully, my
husband doesn’t either.
i am thankful i am not a frog!
ReplyDeleteLove this concept. Balance in all things...and the cartoon is pretty rad too :)
ReplyDeleteYes Raboi, that would be awkward.
ReplyDeleteSammish--my mother sent me that. I agree: rad.