When I was married in 1967 it was still very much a man’s world.
A bride was supposed to be a virgin dressed in white handed over by father to husband and she then took her husband’s name.
Only he could raise the mortgage from the bank, sign the legal documents to buy a house, or get insurance.
The woman was expected to be a stay-at- home housewife and got “housekeeping’ or ‘pocket’ money from his wages.
Her work wasn’t regarded as work – it counted for nothing in the” real world”.
This unspoken hypocrisy that completely ignored (and continues to ignore in our Gross National Product) women’s unpaid work such as raising children, care-giving, housework etc etc) still outrages me, despite the changes that have occurred since the bad old days.
In only a blink of the historical eye, marriage is now no longer a prison for women; no longer an oppressive institution that treats women as items of property, handed from father to husband.
But it has a history that is hard to dismantle and even harder for feminists to forget.
For at least 3 thousand years, marriage was propagated by the State, the Law and Religion as an institution that forced women into unvalued slavery of kitchen, bedroom and children.
Your biology was your destiny; if born with a penis your power lay out in the public sphere, while the birth right of vagina meant you were allocated the background of private arena.
Marriage as a trumped up legal form of prostitution kept women financially dependent, tying them and their children to the men who ruled their lives.
A wedding formalised the marriage in law, granting a moral imperative for the couple to have children within the sanctioned family unit.
Birthing children out of wedlock was considered a sin of the highest order and accorded great shame to a “ruined” woman and bastard child.
The male instigator was considered a “rake” but not shamed and not cast out of the bosom of the legitimised family circle.
The family unit was seen as society in embryo.
The patriarch was the head, the woman his helpmate, the children his to control.
The family unit was the means by which transference of property and power through patriarchal lineage was accomplished and ordered.
The tragedy and glory of Love is that it transcends heterosexuality, race, religion, age and custom.
In Aotearoa at least, our patriarchal inheritance is being chipped away.
Our culture is becoming more and more accepting of love’s various couplings; gay marriage, civil unions, racially mixed marriage, second and even third marriages with children from both couple’s past all intermingling - and even no marriage at all.
All these lifestyles are becoming socially acceptable as family units in which to rear children.
Nowadays, women are expected to be financially independent and a married couple make their own financial arrangements with the bank and the law.
In the case of divorce, the law of Aotearoa protects women and children to a limited extent.
Since 1971, there are social benefits to support women with their children if they leave their husbands.
Celibacy before marriage is mostly not expected for women (for men it never was).
Many couples marry after living together for some time with no social stigma.
Living together and having children out of marriage is common.
Illegitimacy and its accompanying shame is thankfully a relic of our near past.
http://www.tarotaotearoa.com/blog/
I'm not exactly sure how I came to find Om Mani Padme Hum about 10 years ago but it has changed my life. It has literally saved my life as well. It gives me joy, peace, and an overwhelming feeling that no matter what is going on around me that everything will be alright. If you know of other tones like it please let me know. Thanks. Peace and love to all.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.