You've Come a Long Way, Maybe

Here is an interesting discussion about the role of women in
American politics. I know I will be putting this book on my
"to read" list.

Gender Equality

At a U.N. event promoting gender equality some had their priorities
straight. From the AP:

"Our goal must be clear," the U.N. chief said. "No tolerance of the
use of rape as a weapon of war. No excuses for domestic violence.
No looking the other way when it comes to sex trafficking, so-called
`honor killings' or female genital mutilation."

Some didn't have their priorities straight, like actress Geena Davis:

"At the dawn of a new millennium — in a world that is over 50
percent female — the message the media sends is that women
and girls have far less value than men and boys," she said.

Davis said research shows that there are three male characters
for every female character across all film ratings and that the
vast majority of female characters "are stereotyped and
hyper-sexualized."

Correct me if I'm wrong.....but hasn't Geena Davis played some
"hyper-sexualized" characters herself?

More Feminist Than the Feminist

It must be frustrating to liberals that strong conservative women like
Sarah Palin are entering the political arena because why else would they
write stuff like this? Liberals want to portray conservatives as sexists.
Since Sarah Palin is in no way sexist, how else can they label her a sexist?
Well call her traditional Christian beliefs sexist!

Premise: Sarah Palin is a self-proclaimed, far-right conservative,
Christian fundamentalist, which connotes a literal interpretation of
the Bible.

Problem: She cherry-picks to make her message more palatable
to the public and ducks the subservient role of women her church
believes in.

Too bad the media who interview Sarah Palin don't know their
Bibles and the fundamentalist theology Palin says she lives by. If
they did, Palin would have to answer the following questions based
on the fact that according to her own church's beliefs, she shouldn't
even be in politics.

First of all, Palin is not a Christian fundamentalist. I've never heard say
anything that would put her in the fundamentalist category. I have never
heard her say she takes the literal view of the Bible. It's kinda like when
the liberals labeled George W. Bush a Christian fundamentalist even
though he believes all faiths lead to heaven (not a traditional Christian
view), believes in evolution, and isn't a regular churchgoer. WHAT A
FUNDIE!!!

Mr. Schaeffer points to 1 Corinthians 11 as proof she's not being obedient
to "sexist" Biblical scriptures. Apparently he didn't read the whole chapter.
The chapter is about women covering their heads during prayer:

But every woman who has her head uncovered while praying or prophesying
disgraces her head, for she is one and the same as the woman whose head is
shaved.

6 For if a woman does not cover her head, let her also have her hair cut off;
but if it is disgraceful for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved,
let her cover her head.

7 For a man ought not to have his head covered, since he is the image and
glory of God; but the woman is the glory of man.

8 For man does not originate from woman, but woman from man;

9 for indeed man was not created for the woman's sake, but woman for
the man's sake.

10 Therefore the woman ought to have a symbol of authority on her head,
because of the angels.

11 However, in the Lord, neither is woman independent of man, nor
is man independent of woman.

12 For as the woman originates from the man, so also the man has his
birth through the woman; and all things originate from God.

13 Judge for yourselves: is it proper for a woman to pray to God
with her head uncovered?

Does Schaeffer know of any American Christian woman that covers her head
while praying? No. Here's the thing: Christians are wise enough to take into
cultural and historical considerations when reading scriptures. Head covering
during Biblical times was the norm. It isn't now. Things change. Here's
something else he forget to mention: In the same chapter where it says men
should be the head of women it also says neither isn't "independent" of each
other. My understanding of that is that each depend on each other and need
each other. None is better than the other.

And to his scriptures about submissiveness there is this response I found:

The difficulty with understanding Paul’s command to wives to “be
subject” to their own husbands is that our grasp of the meaning of
the word “submit” is too narrow. Generally speaking, we think that
the word “submit” is synonymous with the word “obey.” We are
inclined to restrict submission to refer only to our response to those
who are in authority over us. Very often, this is the case—but not
always. Paul’s instruction in verse 21 is directed to every believer.
Christians, without exception, are to “be subject to one another,”
without any exceptions. Submission, then, must not only work
“upward” (in terms of authority), but also downward.

Submission doesn't mean not having a mind of your own and just being
obedient. Speaking of obedience....isn't funny how he is shocked to find
that Sarah Palin isn't obedient to her church. What a sexist!

Every weekend I go to church it is full of women. There is often times
more women at the service than men. Having traditional Christian values
doesn't mean you're a sexist. Having politically conservative values doesn't
mean you're a sexist either.

Coming of Age

I absolutely love coming of age movies, where a character (or characters)
grow from being an adolescent to an adult. My personal favorite being Stand
by Me. I've heard the question asked before: Why aren't there more female
coming of age movies?" It does seem that most coming of age movies are
from boy to man. Let me give you some reasons why I believe this to be so.

First, I would say that male coming of age stories are probably simpler to
tell because male attributes are much easier define. I think we usually associate
things like being independent, a provider and a protector with "manliness."
(This is not to say that women aren't independent, providers and protectors
they just generally get associated with men, wrongly or rightly.) However,
what attributes do we automatically associate with women? This is much
harder to define. And the qualities we do attribute to women are not politically
acceptable in Hollywood. For example, women are nurturers. The folks in
Hollywood want to deny that most (not all) women have a nurturing nature.

So it is easier to tell a story of an immature, irresponsible bachelor who learns
his one night stand is pregnant and steps up and becomes a man that takes full
responsibility for his new family (like in Knocked Up) than it would telling
a women coming to age story because it is politically incorrect to attribute any
particular quality to a woman.