The war on women

There is a so-called "war on women" going on today around the globe.  There are many reasons for this and the following is not to say that women are to blame. Instead it is to provoke thought about how things are, how men may see things, and how things must change. 

 I would posit that a good part of the backlash against women is from the way males feel they no longer have the hegemony they have been used to for so long under patriarchy.  Of course this will be painful and uncomfortable for them but in order for things to be equal, the Women's Movement and the expression of the Divine Feminine had to happen.  A short look at how a few changes have affected men may be helpful.

For example, women still have all-female enclaves (baby showers, bridal showers, and other all-female activities) but all-male activities and groups have been forced to include women. There has been a noticable uptick in men wanting their own space (can we say "man-cave?") to be with just men. When I was a kid, there were men-only clubs but the Women's Movement changed all that and not for the better I would chance to say.

There has also been a notable change in the nightly sitcoms wherein males are now depicted as bumbling fools compared to the females in the programs. As one guy I know said, "Look at the representations of men in prime-time television; they are either violent and sexist or they are stupid fools falling all over wise women. That is what my son has to look at?" This means that even progressive men are feeling a sense of marginalization.


Many progressive men, the kind who are very sensitive to women's needs and feelings, are getting frustrated with the games women play with them. They chafe at the "men are all pigs" labels and feel they are being judged by the bad apples when they are not themselves behaving like that.

Conversely, many men are labelled with the "nice guy" moniker but that is a death-knell for getting anywhere sexually or romantically. As one guy put it to me, "The nice guys are treated like wimps by women who seem to date the rude, sexist, and controlling guys. If a guy is nice, people accuse him of being gay and women will avoid him. So some guys change and start being assholes just to get a date."

This is where men are today and it is not a comfortable position in which to occupy.

What can be done to make things better?  In our effort to become equal, women have set the male as the default instead of elevating the feminine as equal.  Women pushed for the ability to do and be what males have done and been.  Yet who pushed for traditionally female activities,  such as mothering and caretaking, to be elevated and valued as equal?  Where was the rush to give mothers their social safety nets for the contribution in human capital development that they do?   Would we women need to push so hard into male territory if we valued traditional female activities equally?  I think not.   

It is time to back off and allow men their all-male enclaves and space.  It is time to elevate the feminine mothering to equal status so everyone supports that with real actions such as social safety nets and social supports for women who opt for full time, at home mothering as a career choice. 

For those things to happen, there will have to be a huge paradigm shift from greed, profit, and personal gain to a focus instead on social and generational gains.  A long-term, delayed gratification, investment-in-future-human-capital  ideology will have to be made.  If this shift were to happen, equal but different would be the way of thinking and both genders might feel better about where they stand in society.

Time and changes

As March grows, I feel the feeling and remember last year.  Last March, I got a phone call which changed everything.  Some for the best and some for the worst.  The upheaval that call created was both physical and emotional and a change in responsibility.  Thinking back on all of it I cannot help the feelings that are bubbling up.

I grew up in a dysfunctional family; just last year I found a name for what my mother is and what my father has tendencies for;  Narcissism.  My father remarried when I was in my early twenties.  She was a woman who pretended to be a Christian but her actions were not.  She had only one child; a son. She liked to smoke, drink, and gamble.    My father allowed this woman to push me  especially out of his life.  Oh he would call me sometimes but he rarely ever visited me and when I began having children, he only visited the oldest ones twice when they were babies.  He never knew the younger two.  He only saw any of them when I made the effort (despite having so little means) to drive up to Vegas to see him. Even then, we never were invited to his home; we always had to meet somewhere else.   He never invited me to his home with his wife after I had kids.  Once, we drove there to see him with the three girls and when they got up late and had to be fed, we couldn't meet them at the time they chose so when we were unable to do so, they flatly refused to meet with us at all.  That was so hurtful;  my children were being rejected as was I and I was hurt and angry.

Then the unthinkable happened;  my father's wife died last March.  Just before she died, her son contacted me to let me know HE was their power of attorney.  We drove there to see my dad in rehab as soon as he called to say she had died because they lived in Vegas away from all family or friends.  I felt I couldn't just leave him there alone and with no one near.   I saw a very weak, old, skinny man who couldn't stop talking about all that he had missed and about his perfect wife.  The more time I spent with him the more I realized how stubborn and sefish he was.  I began to like him less and less.  My compassion for him was diminishing moment by moment yet I couldn't abandon him.  Call it compassion or stupidity but I just couldn't walk away and let him die.

My step-brother and his girlfriend revealed a selfish streak when they wouldn't even allow me to remove a picture of myself and my brothers to make copies for myself;  I also was able to get a copy of the wills and trust papers only to find that my father placed his own mother's well being and home in jeopardy of being taken out from under her by his wife or her son if he had died first.  My grandmnother was then 96 years old and had lived on that land since she was 9 years old!  His duplicity and stupidity in allowing himeslf to be so manipulated so that if he had died his wife and her son got everything, including my grandmother's only home,  made me furious.  I told my grandmother what he had done.  She got him to put the property back in her name ONLY at my insistance.  When the step brother could see that my grandmother and I were not going to allow him to use my father for his own ends; he took the money my dad offered him (which was from my step-mom's account) and left; he  put it in writing that he gave up the power of attormey and all claims against my dad and his estate.

This left me scrambling to get my father's care and welfare worked out.  At first I did what my father asked of me but I soon realized he was addicted to painkiller drugs and  I had to start making decisions which looked mean at first but which ultimately saved his life.  This was so time consuming and hard for me.  I was not used to bossing around my parent;  it took a lot of getting used to.  I even had to do things he didn't like such as getting rid of some of his things because they smelled of smoke and the doctor said he should live without them.

The day I had to walk into his apartment for the first time was so emotional for me;  I cried because I had never been invited in over 20 years to their home.  It was awful;  it smelled like an ashtray and the carpet and some furniture was black from her smoking.   She said she couldn't sit in church because of her fibromyalgia but she could sit at casino slot machines or at bingo every day?  How could he have been so stupid as to not see her for the lying, smoking, drinking, gambling bar fly that she was?  Her only son didn't even return for her burial!

As my husband and I went through his things to pack them and move  him,  I began to see evidence that her gambling cost them so much money.  I was horrified at the amount of money she went through and at the amount of money they sent to fundamentalist Christian groups to "buy" their way into God's good graces because they both KNEW they were not living the life they professed to believe.  I became disgusted in the extreme at their hypocrisy.  I was especially angry that they could spend so much money on these things but never sent my children a dime for birthdays or Christmas.  Not that they owed us but that their sefishnss at not wanting to even see their only grandchildren, much less send them a dollar, was awful.  Her son never had any kids so mine were the ONLY ones between  them.

She was so selfish in wanting him all to herself (as well as his money all to herself) that she persuaded him (and he let her!) to stay away from his only grand kids.  Now he is filled with remorse and asks why they won't see him.  At first I tried to be kind but eventualy I just told him that they don't know him and they have no connection with him because he ignored them all those years.  I told him it is too late now; they really don't want to see him and especially not after the tons of trouble and stress he caused me this past year.  I didn't tell him to hurt him;  he just kept asking and asking so I felt it was unfair to keep lying to him and giving him hope.  He needs to get on with his life in assisted living.

I had to take away his car because the doctors say he cannot drive.  I had to make others responsible for his medication management and administration because he almost overdosed and killed himself more than once.  I had to put him in assisted living because I have no room for him in my rented home and he needs more care than I can give.   I had to take over his finances because he would have used them to get more drugs or to rent a car and drive.  He already put a man in the hospital last year before I was able to take the car away and he had no remorse about the injuries the man sustained.  All he could think about was his MONEY. 

I was sickened by him and still feel disgust every time I have to see him.  How awful is that?  I rarely call him (it costs me to do so as he lives 3 hrs and a lower elevation from me because of his CHF).  I rarely visit him because the cost of gas is too high.  We had to move him three times; the money he gave me to protect it from the injured man is gone because of his bad choices.  He ran through over $20,000 in less than a year because of his addiction and my not knowing how bad things were.  Had I known, I would have only moved him once into the assisted living place he is in now and saved him a lot of money and me and my husband a lot of time, energy and heartache.   Hindsight is always better than current vision.

The feelings I am having about this time last year are jumbled into sadness, anger, hope and feeling good that I did the right thing despite my disgust.  He is alive, in a place which has things for him to do, he is being carefully managed medically and he has friends.  Instead of revenge, I can sleep at night because I did the compassionate and humane thing.  Even though some of it was painful for both of us and it is an uneasy relationship (he hates being controlled by me) I know he is alive to live more years.   More than anything, I did it for my grandmother because he is her only son and walking away would have devastated her.  I love her and could not bear to do anything which would cause her hurt. 

At least this year I can look forward to my son's birthday on March 11 without having to rush to Vegas to deal with my dad's mess.  This time, I face March with hope and happiness because my youngest child and only son turns ten soon.  And I can know that through it all, I was an example to my children for what being like Ghandi, Christ, MLK, and many others  really means; love your neighbor; even if he is your disgusting and selfish and neglectful father.  Do it because that is the right and compassionate and kind and humane thing to do.  Revenge doesn't taste sweet;  compassion does.