Conference quark::mennotes-v1

501.0. "FRIENDS AND WOMANKIND: A Friend's Viewpoint" by GWYNED::YUKONSEC (Leave the poor nits in peace!) Thu Sep 06 1990 16:43

    I posted this in TINCUP::QUAKER and MOMCAT::WOMANNOTES-V3.  It was
    suggested that I post it here also.  As I said in WOMANNOTES, if it
    is inappropriate, the moderators are free to delete it.
    
    
    This is from a little pamphlet I have.  Actually, this *is* a little 
    pamphlet I have.  
        
    It is not entered as an exercise in getting converts, and should not
    be construed as such.  I enter it because of what it says about 
    Quakers, and our attitudes toward women.  
        
    Dr. Mary Steichen Calderone is a physician specializing in public
    health.  She is also a member of the Religious Society of Friends.
    I think she wrote this about 1984, but I'm not positive.  It is, I 
    think, still relevant.
    
    Note:  Where there are two sets of quotation marks, Dr. Calderone
           entered a quotation.
    
    
    ""Who comprises mankind?" Everyone, men, women and children." 
    ""Who comprises womankind?"  Women."
    ""Why the separate-but-not-equal term womankind, as if women were a 
    sub-species?"  Why, indeed?"
    ""Why not use humankind to mean men, women, and children, and mankind 
    only as the equivalent of womankind?"  Why not?
    
                            ----------------------
    
    ""In a large southern city I noticed in some of the older public 
    buildings that there were separate washrooms still labeled 'colored 
    women' and 'white ladies'."  Separate but never equal."
    ""Didn't that seem to black women like an insult?"  It surely did."
    ""If the signs had read 'colored ladies' and 'white women', wouldn't 
    black women have felt just as much put down?"  Maybe more so."
    ""Then what about the washroom signs I saw in a large modern 
    building--these signs read 'Men' and 'Ladies'."  Same kind of put down, 
    by sex instead of color."
    
                            ----------------------
    
     "Being a Quaker lays on one the responsibility for engaging in a 
    continuing internal process of finding out what one really believes in, 
    and relentlessly tracking down one's own bigotries, prejudices, 
    inconsistencies, blindness, and refusals to recognize truth and accept 
    it as such.  Conversations with oneself like the above are part and 
    parcel of that process."
     "It is kind of a gadfly one carries around within one as a Friend--but 
    gladly.  If one cannot achieve such open conversations with oneself, it 
    is certain that communication with God will not be open."
     "Friends have always been especially sensitive to and questioning 
    about the ways in which human beings relate to each other, in a 
    continuing re-examination of their own inner and outer relationships.  
    This consistent component of Quakerism has resulted in the equally 
    consistent and insistent habit Friends have of looking upon and 
    treating all human beings as persons, regardless of age, color, 
    economic status, religion, occupation or gender."
     "Walk cheerfully over the land, seeking that of God in every*one*"... 
    George Fox [the leader of the Quakers, though not really a "founder"]
    never assumed that spiritual development was the sole province of men.   
    Men and women Friends have always shared their responsibility, 
    ministry, and accomplishment, as well as their seeking and suffering.  
    Mary Dyer was hanged for persisting in her right to be a Quaker.  
    Elizabeth Fry initiated one of the longest-held Friends' 
    concerns--prison reform.  Friends were among the first to educated men 
    and women equally.  Some of the women's movement's great heroines are 
    Quakers--Lucretia Mott and Susan B. Anthony, leading abolitionists and 
    feminists, and Alice Paul, author of the women's rights amendment."
     "To Friends, a woman is first and foremost a person; as it happens, a 
    female one, but a person in her own right.  As such, she is separate 
    and equal to, but not the same as, a man, who is a person in *his* own 
    right."
     "Friends perceive "personhood" as uniquely human.  It is bestowed upon 
    us as humans, by God.  It is a gift claimable by each of us on behalf 
    of ourselves, but only as we work to make it available to all others.  
    Because Quakers recognize that the process of change starts at home, 
    within oneself, the struggle for "personhood" is an individual one that 
    moves toward achievement only as one helps others achieve theirs."
     "Today we see a rising of women in groups, acting on behalf of 
    themselves as individuals and collectively, but not often enough on 
    behalf of men.  There are probably two main reasons, both hopefully 
    moving into past history, for this one-sided concern by women."
     "The first one lies in the undoubted sexism of males.  Collectively, 
    throughout the centuries, men controlled women in all of their 
    activities, by any number of subtle and not-so-subtle devices--legal, 
    social, economic or psychological.  Women today are quite rightly 
    identifying and resisting these devices.  Happily, so are some men on 
    behalf of women, in recognition that these devices have served both 
    sexes very poorly."
     "The second reason is perhaps a general unawareness of how shackled 
    men have become by their own self-forged bonds.  Consider the terrible 
    demands the "male role" makes on male human beings: they must wage war 
    on each other, be strong and never weep, brave and never admit to fear, 
    achieve "success" at all costs, bear the brunt of the economic 
    responsibilities for their families, be able always to "score" sexually 
    with women.  And consider how many things they have been prevented from 
    being, or doing because it was "unmasculine": dancing, cooking, being 
    intimately involved in raising their children, being affectionate to 
    their male friends. . . . It is always risky to generalize, but these 
    things are probably true for many men within the Society of Friends as 
    well as in society at large."
     "One hardly thinks of Friends, men or women, as revolutionaries and, 
    in truth, their outer demeanor, comportment and life style have tended 
    to be quiet and conservative.  But on major social issues--slavery, 
    peace, alternative service during was, religious ecumenicism, racial 
    equality--on such issues Quaker concern and conscience come on strong.  
    Quaker voices are usually heard loud and clear "speaking truth to 
    power.""
     "Friends can witness to the need of males as well as of females for 
    liberation on many fronts simply as human beings.  The significance of 
    revolutions never lies in what they are *against*, but in what they 
    are *for*."
     "And, despite some objections to tactics, it is clear that Friends 
    have much to gain from the women's movement in our own search for 
    "personhood" for all people.  Behind the rhetoric and the clamor is a 
    heartfelt and justified plea from women on behalf of women, to be 
    allowed to become full human beings, with maximum possible fulfillment.  
    Clearly, humankind will not be able to find and witness to that of God 
    in each of us until its major elements--men and women-- perceive and 
    witness to that of God in themselves and in each other.  This must be 
    in the course of all of their daily relationships, whether in the 
    family, at work, in recreation, and in worship."