Returning to the Religion of the Earth: Living Outside of Patriarchy

Hello, Sisters. It's International Women's Day today, but I wanted to write about how to make every day women's days! I've thought a lot over the years about whether I should just "play the game" and operate within the confines of male "law and order" or if I should revolt. I decided that the best course of action is to, as Sonia Johnson put it "Live outside patriarchy" and an article by Radical Kitten does a great job of putting this philosophy into perspective by saying "it is...crucial for us to understand this, in order to see what is wrong with activism like lobbying for legal change, demonstrations etc. because what all of these things boil down to is talking to men, negotiating with men, believing in men’s authority to decide over us, believing in their reality, the foreground. It’s fundamentally reactive. It is giving men and their system our energy by resisting it. What we resist persists because it means using our life force to prop it up. In one of her speeches Sonia Johnson describes patriarchy as a castle and women as outside the walls trying to get in. We use all our strength to ram their door in. They strengthen the walls. By reacting to it, we give it credibility. What we should do instead is turn on our heels and walk into the forest. Let the men rot in their stinking castle. This is their biggest fear. That we will stop obeying or rebelling against their rules. As long as we are fixated upon their stupid castle we aren’t looking around at the beautiful trees, we aren’t aware of the sweet air on our skin, we aren’t listening to the Inner Voice. Which is of course the purpose of letting us “participate” in “politics” at all. If it didn’t serve men’s purpose to let us vote, demonstrate, petition, educate men and boys, in other words, play their game from whatever disadvantaged position, they wouldn’t do it. It’s their game. They invented it, they invented the rules, the board and the figurines too. As long as we are busy trying to ascend in their hierarchy, or getting them to change the rules of the game, as long as we think we have a stake in playing their game, as long as we are invested in it we will not walk away. Which is of course exactly what we need to do and this is what radical (firebrand) feminism is really about."  

Once I saw the world through the correct feminist lens, I knew I had to shed off the patriarchal, religious indoctrination that we all receive worldwide. I want to use a current example in order to show you the importance of ridding yourself of patriarchal religions. Joy Behar recently made a comment on "The View" when she equated Mike Pence's Christian Faith with mental illness. ABC news had over 30,000 calls from people who were outraged about her statement. The one group of people you can't criticize or demonize in this world are Christians. Nearly every village, town and city have at LEAST a dozen churches and it is fact that Christians have public and private privilege just like men as a class do. What Joy Behar said was actually true and the truth hurts but first it will piss you off, right! But is there another way she could have made that statement without throwing herself under the chopping block while at the same time teaching a valuable lesson to her co-workers and female viewers? There actually is. Instead of just all-out calling christianity a mental illness, how about we ignore the men and say to the females- "For women to imagine and honor a female deity is a sign of mental health. How sane can we be if we honor God as a tall white male-who we are relatively short, mortal, female, and of many colors. I imagine if women understood that Mary is not a virgin (in the Christian sense) and that she has a daughter, not a son. Listen to Z: "a self created God who has no mother is a totally unsupportable concept". To deny motherhood is to deny women, and there are two kinds of people; mothers and their children" The Holy Book of Women's Mysteries by Z Budapest.

So, once I was able to recognize, dissect and dismantle the tools of patriarchy that were controlling (and poisoning) my entire life; body, mind and spirit- I was able to begin rebuilding a life that enabled my family to live outside patriarchy. Now, before I share with you what I've done to do this, I want to disclose to you that I am a disabled woman with a disabled child. I am a victim of child molestation, forced prostitution, rape, abandonment and neglect.....you name it! The cycle of these abuses seem to repeat themselves generation after generation among the women in my family who cater to and invest in men's futures instead of themselves and their children. I will not repeat this cycle of being a handmaiden and mouthpiece for the brotherhood of man and fatherhood of god. I have already broken it and I hope you will too! 

On that note, What have I done to live outside patriarchy? Basically, I am rewriting all our family holidays and traditions, designing a unique Sacred Earth Curriculum (Correctulum) for Homeschooling my kids which includes intervention for special needs, a Gift Economy Network we call XGEN, Seed Saving & Land Owning, free mtDNA & Matriline Geneaology research, and so much more. You can check out all the work i'm doing by checking out my websites:

xanthosearthkeepers.com (for family)

thehouseofthedevi.com (for women)

motherline-mtdna.com (for women)

earthbounderasmus.com (for men)

P.S. EVERYTHING I DO IS 100% FREE.

I hope this helps inspire more women in "Living Outside Patriarchy". May we build a True Matriarchy and a long lasting revolutionary sisterhood and end the unnatural, perpetual cycle of patriarchy's death march. So mote it be. The video included is one that I created. Feel free to share it widely. Thanks for your time!

J. Renee Anthony

Matrilineal Genealogist and HERstorian

Resources

https://radicalkitten.wordpress.com/2014/04/17/little-rad-finds-her-way-...

http://dailysignal.com/2018/02/26/abc-silent-mauling-pences-christian-fa...