SYSTEMIC, STRUCTURAL SEXISM (In America)

It's funny that the European countries we were beholden to and where most of us immigrated from are so much further advanced than we are when it comes to equality and social policies. Even Mexico, to our South, and Spanish-controlled Florida in the 1800's had abolished slavery when the trade was at it's peak in our country. And ever since racial equality has been a thing and gender equality (and insert social justice or policy issue here), the Europeans, namely British and French have been way ahead of us, Great Britain's Slavery Abolition Act of 1834 following France by some 40 years. Spain, who brought slavery to this continent, signed a pact with the U.K. in 1817 to abolish the slave trade. And even though we got on board in 1865 after the Civil War tore this country apart, slaves still weren't free. After a short period of "reconstruction," the South still persisted with the "new slavery," sharecropping, and Jim Crow Laws. It took the civil unrest of the 1960's to finally end the systemic racism and oppression of African Americans, a cancer that hasn't been totally eradicated from our culture.

Women's suffrage was a popular civil rights movement some four decades earlier. Still, women don't enjoy the same freedoms, bodily autonomy or adequate compensation for similar work as men.

This is one reason we need more female representation in the Executive, Judicial and Legislative branches of U.S. Government. How can we call this a "representative democracy," a republic, when our Legislative branch is dominated and controlled by old, white men? The disparity was called out in an April committee meeting on Capitol Hill by Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA).

Pool/Getty Images (Google)

In a Young Turks video from April that garnered 2.4 million views, Rep. Porter goes head-to-head with a Heritage Foundation official, Dr. Burke, at this hearing. "Only about 28% of members of Congress are women. The median age of the Senate is 65 and the median age in the House is 58...so, on average, lots of older people, lots of older men," as she points out that policies protecting women's rights, especially single mothers, are never prioritized. These policies, specifically early childhood education, "won't benefit many members, most, the average member of Congress...even when their kids were young, most members leaned most heavily on their wives, and I say wives because most members are men...Too many in Congress don't get it because they didn't have to live it," Rep. Porter said.

She calls out "the familiar policy pattern" in Congress to invest in things they understand. "The collective body of older, richer men in Congress OVER-invest in things they understand (emphasis hers)." She claims policies to benefit single mothers don't personally benefit the average member of Congress and so they don't try to understand the problem as it never affected them personally, so they don't invest public dollars to support things like early childhood education.

STRUCTURAL SEXISM
Rep. Porter continued to call out her male colleagues for ignoring the plight of women, in general, and single mothers, in particular. She identified the ongoing inequality in public policy a result of "structural sexism."

"When we say that structural sexism continues to permeate this body...and our policies, that's what we're talking about. We're not imagining it." She claims that policies to benefit women are what "always ends up on the cutting room floor in legislation." She intends to make structural sexism go away with more progressive policies. "Women can and must contribute to our economy if we're going to have a globally competitive economy." Rep. Porter hopes that her colleagues will be moved to take action by "this single mom asking them to care, on behalf of all the other parents of young children who are struggling in this country." She claims to be the only single mother in Congress. She asked the committee, "What about the 10 million single moms? Where do they fit?"

She concluded by saying, "I'm sharing my story because my story doesn't get heard in Congress...Our whole perspective here is warped by the fact that this body is so disproportionately UN-representative of the American people's experience."

Springer Link says, "Structural sexism refers to discriminatory beliefs or practices on the basis of sex and gender that are entrenched in societal frameworks and which result in fairly predictable disparities in social outcomes related to power, resources, and opportunities. [It] also functions to normalize and legitimate such beliefs, practices, and inequalities of conditions and outcomes."

An October 2022 study by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) reports, "Structural sexism manifests via norms that constrict women’s social participation, including at work." Furthermore, "Intimate partner violence (IPV) is underpinned by structural sexism, patriarchal norms, and unequal gender power dynamics."

FSU Assistant Professor Patricia Homan developed a new structural sexism approach to the study of gender inequality and health.  Her approach, published 2019 in the American Sociological Review, goes beyond sexist mistreatment by individuals to examine how the degree of systematic gender inequality in power and resources — i.e. structural sexism — in a society can impact people’s health. This was the same focus as the above-referenced NIH study. Both point to the effects on children and society, not just women. "Structural sexism can be evident in major social institutions, such as the government and the economy, in interpersonal interactions and relationships, such as marriages and in individuals’ beliefs and identities." The effects in government were pointed out quite well by Rep. Porter. Professor Homan came to the same conclusion about more progressive policies to reduce it's impact. “The first thing we need to realize is that gender inequality in the United States is not only a human rights issue, but also a public health problem,” she said. “Therefore, gender equity policy is health policy.”

WHY DO I CARE?
You might wonder why I began with the issue of slavery and racism. Well, because one led to the other as a systemic societal issue, one that persists today. We will never eradicate racism, but we can educate. The same applies to any social issue, including gender inequality.

I have raised two daughters, one who just celebrated her 20th birthday, the other turns 23 in a few days. Both of them were adopted, my youngest daughter is African-American. That is why I liken the race and gender inequality issues. She faces them both and suffers micro-aggressions on the daily, even in progressive parts of Colorado. That's why I care deeply about these issues, but specifically the sexism that is so deeply entrenched into the fabric of our culture.

My daughters both have a problem with this patriarchal society, as do I. We finally have a woman of color in the White House, but it'll still be many, many years before one is elected to the highest office. As Rep. Porter points out, my daughters, especially my youngest, are so under-represented in Congress and at all levels of government, that it's no wonder.

Screen captured image from a YouTube video posted by Graduate School of Social Work - DU, titled "Power Privilege and Oppression," uploaded six years ago

The history of humankind, as we've been taught for eons, was pushed and pedaled by the patriarchy. They have controlled the narrative, from the time of the ancient sages until the present. We've been force fed a whitewashed, male-dominated version of human history. Why did it take until 2016's "Hidden Figures" film with Tom Hanks for most of us to learn that black women were behind our successful lunar missions at NASA??? Their stories, by and large, are untold in the history books. Harriet Tubman was one of the exceptions in history class, and not the rule. How many female heroins does the Bible exalt? Exactly, very few. The Judeo-Christian worldview for all of time has been one of patriarchy. God, the giver of life, has always been portrayed as an old, white man. Why does God possess a gender? And why would we assume his race? Jesus was born of a Virgin Middle Eastern woman OF COLOR! He was a man of color. Seems kind of silly that we've been pedaled a patriarchal view even in Sunday School.

I've fought hard against these stereotypes and have encouraged my girls, likewise. They grew up to be feminists just by their observations of the world. I merely joined them when they were old enough to make these judgments about society for themselves. And because I don't want them to suffer the inequality of old, nor for their potential daughters to grow up in a patriarchal society, I've pushed for more gender equality and been an outspoken advocate of same...for my daughters and granddaughters benefit. Men have ruled the narrative--the church, government and history--for quite long enough.

"White people are scared to death right now, particularly white males. They are scared to death they are going to lose their power in the future, and they are," says renowned race relations teacher Jane Elliott. "If you want to be treated well in the future, treat people well in the present."

Humanism v. Monotheism in the Context of Individual Rights

Defining Terms and Values

hu·man·ism noun

an outlook or system of thought attaching prime importance to human rather than divine or supernatural matters. Humanist beliefs stress the potential value and goodness of human beings, emphasize common human needs, and seek solely rational ways of solving human problems.

The Humanist values what it can see, think and feel. They value the cognitive capacity of human beings to rationally consider all sides of an issue without the aid of religion or what I call “magical thinking.”

mon·o·the·ism noun

the doctrine or belief that there is only one God.

The monotheist, and for most Americans this translates Christian, values only what is taught in Holy Scriptures as “the law” or “the word of God.” It sees the world in terms of black-and-white, us-and-them, right-and-wrong, saved-unsaved, heaven-or-hell, righteous-sinner… There is no gray area where life is actually lived. It is filled with “magical thinking.” The fact that you have to conjure up some image of what this deity looks like—in most opinions, male—acts like or thinks like is where imagination comes in, thus “magical thinking.”

Let’s apply these terms and values to the debate on abortion and individual rights.

Liberal-minded Christian with Humanistic Leanings

As a liberal-minded Christian, with Humanist leanings, I can say with near certainty that the core of the “pro choice” stance is human dignity, liberty and Constitutionally-protected rights. It is not about the life and death struggle, the tug of war between mom and baby. It’s about the inalienable rights of the woman who has already survived the gestation period and several years on planet Earth. How do the rights of an embryonic life form, with nothing more recognizable than a heartbeat, trump the rights of a living, breathing human being? Have you seen what the fetus looks like when there’s a detectable heartbeat? It resembles a blood-red jelly bean.

Conservative-minded Christian View

As a conservative-leaning monotheist, which I once was, I can say with near certainty that the core of the “pro life” stance is the belief that life is God-ordained and begins at the moment of conception. It’s not even a question about women’s rights or even the health and well-being of the mother. It’s merely the fact that a life has been conceived in a woman’s womb, that sacred space where they believe God miraculously breathes life into the cells of this fertilized egg, a zygote.

I’ve batted for both teams, so to speak. I don’t speak from a limited understanding of the issue, of what’s at stake. I see both sides of the coin. But it does, indeed, boil down to a matter of individual rights, and whether you default immediately to the fetus/baby’s side or to the woman/mother’s, you have to choose who’s rights are more at stake here.

The U.S. Supreme Court has spoken, nearly 50 years ago. But it wasn’t so many years before that, women were fighting for equal rights, and black women for equal rights was only a decade older than Roe v. Wade! 

So let us look at equal rights, shall we?

EQUALITY

The Declaration of Independence states, “We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness….” which, at face value, seems to be like a wholly monotheistic ideal. But is it really?

At the time this declaration was penned in 1776, chattel slavery was a widely-accepted practice in the American colonies. Brought to the colonies by the Dutch in the early 1600’s, one could argue that the very republic was built on the backs of non-white slaves. That fact alone stands in complete contradiction to the opening assertion of the Declaration. Were not the slaves endowed by their Creator?

Slavery was an institution supported by the Church and justified by Scripture. In fact, nowhere in Scripture is this concept of equality for all found, certainly not equality for slaves or women. Off the top of my head, the Book of Hebrews is the only place I can recall where equality is preached at all! And there, it is equating the Christian to the Jew as “God’s chosen,” “his children,” “joint heirs” in the promise of Abraham. I would argue that even that Scripture is only saying the Christian male and Jewish male adherents are equal in God’s eyes.

Even the Creation Story itself doesn’t promote the myth of equality. God created Adam from the dust of the Earth. Eve was created out of Adam. From Genesis forward, I don’t see a single shred of evidence where women share an equal footing with men. That patriarchal system, established in “the beginning,” was by God’s design. It influenced the very men who wrote the sacred texts, the bishops who canonized The Bible and the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence.

Even the founding fathers of our nation didn’t all share the same views on monotheism v. humanism. This concept of equality that they immortalized in the Declaration was a myth. It wasn’t supported by Scripture, even though it has very religious overtones, and it wasn’t even practiced in the colonies by the men who wrote it. They believed women inferior, slaves inferior (lower than livestock) and any non-white inferior to them. So what was this equality they spoke of? An ideal? An unrealized goal?

I would say, yes.

Women, slaves and non-whites had to struggle for equality and most didn’t achieve it until the last half of the 20^th Century. It wasn’t achieved in 1776 with the Declaration, nor in 1863 with the Emancipation Proclamation, nor even in 1920 with the success of the suffrage movement and adoption of the 19^th Amendment. The dream of equality, heretofore just a myth, is just now being realized in the 21^st Century, and not just for women but for “all Men,” gay, straight or otherwise.

Is this a God-given right or a human right? I’d argue the latter.

Left to well-meaning monotheists, this right would never have been endowed upon anyone but the white men who codified the rules, enforced them, preached them and interpreted them. We’ve only seen cracks form in the patriarchal system of control handed down to us from Abraham, and later Moses from Mt. Sinai.

Humanists would argue that we haven’t gone far enough. Their view is that monotheism and patriarchy have done enough damage, run their course. Let the idea of inherent human dignity be the sole driving force behind equal treatment under the law—no God required.

That’s at the heart of the abortion debate—human rights.

I don’t feel that the woman’s right to chose what to do with her pregnancy is anybody else’s business. Like “all Men,” she has bodily autonomy and unless that fetus is grown in a test tube, it certainly depends on the “host,” as some have labeled pregnant women. They are not merely hosts. They are living, breathing life-support systems. They can determine for themselves if a pregnancy is wanted or unwanted. They can make this medical decision for their own bodies and fetuses, just as any human being has a right to bodily autonomy.

Granting women this right, which took from 1776 – 1973 (grasp that span of time for a moment), is a logical step towards this ideal which our forefathers set out in the Declaration. That is nearly 200 years to realize this dream of equality for a woman to be given equal treatment under the law. Are we now to repeal what took 197 years to establish?

Patriarchy, bred of monotheistic ideals, would certainly answer that question with a resounding YES! The establishment would have us believe that the Supreme Court made a mistake. The most outspoken of those on the far right would make a case for a theocracy—a system of shariah-like law practiced in other monotheistic states.

The humanist in me must reject such magical thinking. God did not descend with his scepter in hand and “bippity, boppity, boop!” life was created miraculously in a woman’s womb. It took a man and a woman, and not necessarily in an act of loving, consent. Still, biologically-speaking, two humans of opposite sex had to join forces to conceive. Life, for a humanist, is not a God-ordained miracle. It is biology. Period.

In that sense, the human beings involved in “pro-creation” are ultimately involved in bringing this life to fruition or choosing to end the gestation period. Even in that case, the male co-conspirator doesn’t have more say over the gestating than the women who bears the sole responsibility. Her body equals her choice.

Their religious-sounding, monotheistic rhetoric aside, the 56 men who declared this myth of equality, even while holding women and slaves in submission, couldn’t foresee a time when abortion would strike at the heart of this myth. But now that the myth, the ideal, has been realized it can’t be stuffed back into it’s 1776 packaging. We won’t return to an 18^th, or even a 20^th, Century mentality, no matter how hard the right pushes us in that direction.

Precedent Setters, the Church v the Court

As I blogged last week about Roe v. Wade, the precedent-setting Supreme Court case from 1973, I believed my case for upholding this nearly 50-year-old ruling was airtight. Well, arguing the points on Facebook did little good to convince anyone. The anti-abortionists on the right cling to their argument equating the medical procedure--for whatever reason--as murder. This is the reason states who are now trying to outlaw abortions are not even allowing exceptions for cases of rape, incest and mother's health. Regardless of what stats, logic or legal precedent you throw at them, it always comes back to "life begins at conception."

The basis for Western morality are the Judeo-Christian Scriptures (Torah/Bible) which were written by Middle Eastern Jews and canonized by European Bishops (the Bible anyway) centuries ago. Wikipedia says, "Which books constituted the Christian biblical canons  of both the Old and New Testament was generally established  by the 5th century, despite some scholarly disagreements, for the ancient undivided Church." To be clear, that was 16 centuries ago or SIXTEEN HUNDRED YEARS! There has been a lot of evolution, science, social change and reinterpretation of the text in that vast expanse of time. Laws that govern current Western culture, still largely based on the moral code of these ancient texts, is revisited and reinterpreted all the time. But let's be, again, very clear that we are talking about a law book canonized 1,600 years ago.

Anti-abortionists want everyone else to buy their theory that this ancient law book trumps all other laws and sets precedent for all time over our current system of governance. That is simply insane!

The precedent for current-day America was set by American judges in the last half of the 20th Century. It was nearly 50 years ago, in my lifetime, that the debate was settled and precedent set--for current day, not 5th Century Europe and certainly not 400 BC Judea! The social norms and mores of those times are mostly irrelevant to the world we inhabit, halfway around the globe, 16 - 26 centuries removed.

That law book, which is a religious artifact, does not set precedent. Our democratic republic is quite simply NOT a theocracy. The separations put in place to protect government from becoming such, are spelled out just as clearly in our Constitution as the right to privacy. The 14th Amendment that protects that right, and served as the basis for Roe v. Wade, was instituted in 1868. So the anti-abortionists, want to erode the protections our forefathers laid out over 150 years ago and wipe away the precedent set by a nearly 50-year-old Supreme Court ruling. Why? So we can return to the barbarism of animal sacrifice and demanding virginal blood be apparent on the marital bedsheets?

They don't merely want to roll back the 1973 protections. They want to return America to the pseudo-safety of the 1950's, of shaming women into having babies that were the products of non-consentual sex, of women remaining silent and knowing their place, of back alley abortions and non-sterilized coat hangers, of putting woman at risk and removing their liberties as equal citizens! It is asinine and insane!

We can't let them lord the control of 5th Century Bishops over our country, our mothers, sisters and daughters any longer! The Supreme Court has spoken, our American forefathers have spoken and the precedent has been set for nearly 50 years. Your ancient religious text doesn't trump that. It's precedence was outdated by the time the Bible was canonized. It's relevance for modern Western culture lacks any real viability--as most of it's taboos on sexuality and women's rights have been long shattered. There will be no dragging back of my America to the dark ages! Not for my generation, not for my daughters', or their daughters' either. Period, end of story.

My latest abortion rights rant

Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides a fundamental "right to privacy" that protects a pregnant woman's liberty to choose whether or not to have an abortion

This is the hot topic these days with Bible belt states pushing back against what has already been established as constitutional in this country--a woman's right to choose what she does with her body and the fetus developing inside of it. The debate for the pro-right, pro-religious agenda, "pro-life" side ALWAYS comes back to "life begins at conception." But now we have ultra-right leaning states pushing even further in attempting to call masturbation murder, as if God ordained every sperm out of every male body on the planet to be the next human baby. That's absurd!

But the "life begins at conception" argument is NO LESS absurd. Not every egg that receives the fertilizing sperm and becomes an embryonic cell is meant to become a contributing member of society--some of them don't even develop into multi-cell organisms, others don't make it past the first month or first trimester, some will develop abnormally with major deformities and become babies who have to be cared for all of their lives or become wards of the state, while still others will become rapists, arsonists, terrorists or serial killers. My point is that NOT EVERY LIFE CONCEIVED is destined for a productive and healthy existence on planet Earth! And what's even more important, we are reaching critical mass on this planet--just ask the polar ice caps!!

And even if you believe that God ordains EVERY SINGLE life from conception, then you believe that he condones rape, incest and sex slavery! Each of these evils produces children.

What's more, if your belief is that every woman who conceives should be forced to carry the baby full-term, and it survives the 10-month ordeal, will you also support this child by paying to improve public education, housing options, transportation options, providing free public health care and higher education??? No, I didn't think so. That'd be socialism.

But get this--we DON'T live in a theocracy or an autocracy, where one diety or person in power gets to "play god" and decide which women can abort their pregnancies and which can't. Most would agree that rape, incest and other abuse victims should be given that right. So if some are allowed and some aren't, that's where my problem lies. It's as stupid as the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy. It's okay to be gay in the armed forces, just hide who you are (and go kill people!). Who are WE (collective population), or THEY (god or government leader) to say who is OK and who ISN'T???

Our government, even approaching 2020, is still by-and-large run by powerful, wealthy, white men (who are insanely rich on the corporate tit) and so I'd ask (for my daughters' sake), WHO ARE THEY to tell them what to do with their bodies or their fetuses. Are any of these "sugar daddies" gonna help my girls through the pains and emotional rollercoaster of pregnancy, or the anguishing pain of childbirth, or the 18+ years they will need assistance in raising my grandchildren?

All human beings have rights and one of those rights, recognized by the courts, is bodily autonomy. The University of California Santa Barbara defines this right as such:

Bodily autonomy is defined as the right to self governance over one’s own body without external influence or coercion. It is generally considered to be a fundamental human right.

Since the planet does not NEED any more babies and even those conceived in the womb are not guaranteed to survive or to be contributing members of society, then there's no need to assert a divine will or manifest destiny to every living embyo. Therefore, we should default, first, to this basic human right, that ALL humans, even women, have autonomy over their own person. Secondly, we have the 14th Amendment and the 1973 Supreme Court decision. As arbiters of the Constitution, they get to tell us, as society, what is allowed and what's not. And last I checked, abortions are allowed.

Before you try and box me into some stereotype, I AM PRO-RIGHTS! I believe in human rights, women's rights, gay rights, voting rights, right to die, right to work, etc., etc...EVEN gun rights, though they should be way more restricted than say voting rights or driving privileges. I believe people have the right to do what they want to with their bodies, to love and marry who they want to, to copulate consentually and either have the babies as a result OR NOT, to smoke pot (it's a plant not a drug) if they want to, to own and shoot guns if they want to...it's not our place to infringe on people's rights for ANY REASON, especially not religious-based reasons!

Quit fighting what's been a social norm (and a legal right) for nearly HALF A CENTURY! No one wants to return to coat hangers or to fight battles over individual rights that have already been won, whether they be civil, women's, LGBTQ+ or otherwise! We WILL NOT return to the 1950's in this country, so please take your seat and enjoy the ride.