When is a political campaign (and I don’t mean an election) a guise for accomplishing something far more sinister and far more dangerous than is claimed?
When seeming attempts to save unborn lives in the name of something holy are really a war on women.
When apparent efforts to prevent abortion in the name of protecting the lives of the unborn are, in actuality, purposeful, planned moves to take away women’s power . . . a war against women.
When men, and most tragically of all, other women themselves, are so afraid of the power women have birthed and claimed in recent times, that they are bound and determined to turn back the times and make women powerless . . . a war against women.
When men, and even women, collude, under the guise of goodness, to make women possessions again . . . possessions of their fathers, possessions of their husbands, possessions of their religions, possessions of the Divine as they perceive the Divine, women making themselves the possessions of others, even women treating themselves like possessions . . . a war against women.
When men, afraid of the growing power women have claimed, and even women themselves are afraid of their own power and the power of other women, and instead of supporting that power and working through their own fears, want to squash that power forever . . . in a war against women.
Wherever else this is happening in our world, it is also happening right now in the United States of America in 2011.
It is rising to bizarre proportions! Last week, there was a bill in Congress that , under the guise of taking action to prevent abortions, would have redefined rape to include only forcible rape . . . and to leave women powerless when they are violated in other ways – by date rape, by rape that occurs when a perpetrator drugs his victim, by rape while a woman is intoxicated or asleep, by rape perpetrated on underage females,by rape when a woman withdraws her consent, or by rape when a woman is trying not to be injured further or is trying to stay alive.
Whatever this bill looked like it was doing, H.R.3, The No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act was, in truth, a war on women’s power, a war on women’s protection, a war on women’s access to help . . . a war against women!
And this bill was one single action in millions that have been taking place and that will continue to take place.
A terrorizing war . . . against women!It’s like a daughter of an incest perpetrator who cuts her off from help in the family, isolates her from the outside world, threatens her loss of safety, threatens her daily survival — food, clothing, shelter, and medical help – squashes her voice, and most dangerous of all, puts on the face of kindness and goodness one minute, while stalking her silently and consistently, so that she is scared all the time.
I know that this is the backlash to the power women have been birthing, growing, and claiming. And I know a backlash was inevitable. We need to take this seriously now! This is a war against women.
If we are going to end this war against women, we – women and men alike – are going to need to do our own inner healing. All of us are part of this, whether we want to know it, acknowledge it, feel it . . . or not! This is no joke! I don’t mean just by reading self help books or going to support groups or even a workshop here and there. We are going to need to heal within us our own fears of being powerless, and also the places where we would take dangerous actions to crush someone else’s power because we are afraid.
There is much more that needs to be said, taught, and healed here than I can do in this short time and space. I hope, though, that I have opened your eyes to see what is really occurring, opened your mind to help you think about the truth of what is happening, and opened your heart to say ‘yes’ to the healing you, yourself, need to do. I also hope that you will pass this on to others . . . whose eyes, minds, and hearts need to open.
Thank you and many blessings,
Judith Barr
(C) Judith Barr, 2011