The Feminist Mistake: A Review

I come to you again, Dear Reader, with my hat in my hand and apologies on my lips.  I have truly struggled with writing this particular review, hence the delay.  Reading this book, and considering feminism in general, has re-opened some old wounds and left me feeling raw, making it difficult to write.  This is not a typical writer's block where one can't think of something to write but rather the opposite - a tangly mess of jumbled up thoughts that have taken a couple of weeks to untangle and in the untangling, made me afraid of my own thoughts.

I found this book to be quite enlightening and informative, but also rather shocking in some places. the book is divided into two parts with the first divided into three stages which discuss "Naming Self," "Naming the World," and "Naming God."  The last part discusses the implications feminism has had in our religious culture and society at large.

Mary Kassian starts with a description of the First Wave of feminism: Mary Wollstonecraft's The Vindication of the Rights of Women in 1792; the Seneca Falls Declaration of Sentiments; Simone de Beauvoir's book The Second Sex; and then to Betty Friedan's Feminine Mystique (reviewed here) - all of these works layering upon the others.   My WEM Book Club read Wollstonecraft.  I purchased the English language version of The Second Sex when I visited Shakespeare and Company in Paris in 1992 but I have yet to read it; at the time I was taking several feminist literature classes and the book was discussed often so I purchased it as a trophy.  The growth of secular feminism from de Beauvoir's book on nurtured and paralleled the growth of spiritual feminism, which is the subject of this book.

Chapter 3 discusses Mary Daly and her book The Church and the Second Sex.  To say it was inflamatory would be a gross understatement.  She was a professor at Boston College, and the book resulted in her firing which caused students to protest.  Sucumbing to student pressure, BC reversed it's decision, reinstated her with "promotion and tenure" for her pains (p. 42).  Daly accused the Church of oppressing women,  "teaching women's inferiority in it's doctrine, harming women through its moral teaching, [and] excluding women from church leadership roles" (p. 42).  Daly went so far as to "reject the theology that presented God as omnipotent, immutable and providential. . . . Futhermore, she viewed images of a jealous and vengeful God as projections and justifications for the role of the 'tyrant father in a patriarchal society' rather then as actual aspects of God's character" (p.47).  And so the trouble begins.  God can't be vengeful and jealous, despite the fact that in His own Word He calls Himself that, because men wrote the Bible. Not just men, but men who lived in a society and at a time where women were viewed as second class citizens and rabbis thanked God every morning they were not born a women or a dog.

The next chapter deals with women who wrote books trying to separate a woman's biology from what her life course should be - just because a woman has the biological equipment for bearing and nourishing offspring doesn't mean she should.  It is important to note that this is when Marxism enters the picture: men are the evil bourgeois who oppress the women proletariat.  One question I'd like to ask some of these women is how am I supposed to overcome my biology and my "reproductive function" (p.53)?  I think the women of NOW would say via abortions. Another woman tried to posit the fact that all men benefit from rape, a weapon the Patriarchy uses to dominate women (p 55).  Crazy talk, I tell you, but I guess when are trying to be on the cutting edge of a cultural revolution, one will say, write, and theorize almost anything.

I'm going to skip ahead to Chapter 14 which discusses how goddess worship, and therefore the worship of self, entered the picture.  Feminist theology began to include rituals which were based in "goddess worship and witchcraft" (p. 192).  Women were encouraged to pray to the ancient mythological goddesses -  Hera, Artemis, Aphrodite, Isis.  Frankly this section made me think of  the only book I ever could not finish because of how uncomfortable I was within my spirit, The Mists of Avalon.  "These women concluded that they did not need a an external 'male God,' for they themselves were goddess" (p.195).  The sin of Lucifer committed again.

There were a couple of women mentioned in this book that I had known of before but had no idea they were involved in developing feminist theology.  One of them was Dr. Phyllis Chessler, who was at one time a frequent contributor at Pajamas Media.  She blogged often on honor killings and how Islam treats women.  In this book, Kassian discusses Chessler's work as a feminist psychologist who believed patriarchy was responsible for women's mental illnesses as revealed in Chessler's book Women and Madness.  I wonder what Dr. Chessler would say about that now, in light of all we have learned since the 60s on brain function and chemical imbalances in the brain.  In surfing around Dr. Chessler's website, there is a memorial to Shulamith Firestone who was the author of a book on feminist revolution which is examined in Kassian's book.  I also noted Dr. Chessler had written another book called Women's Inhumanity to Women.  I can only hope she discusses the war women wage against each other.

Another mentioned author that Christians should be aware of is Virginia Mollenkott who wrote books on biblical imagery being feminine and advocating calling God "He/She/It" (p.170).  Mollenkott was also a consultant on the NIV: her role is disputed and the NIV Translation Board has denied she had any impact.  I cannot help but wonder and the NIV is not my main version of choice.

By far the saddest chapter is "Drifting Away," which details what happened to three women who were very involved in the feminist movement and constructing a feminist theology.  The three women all walked away from God and their faith, rejecting Him.  Kassian notes: "Many Christians view feminism as an ideology that merely promotes the genuine dignity and worth of women.  If this were true, feminism would definitely be compatible with Christianity . . . . But the philosophy of feminism adds a subtle, almost indiscernible twist to the basic Biblical truth of woman's worth" (p.261).

If accepting feminism means rejecting God and my faith, I will have none of it.  As I mentioned at the beginning, this book re-opened a few wounds.  And surprisingly, there were certain things I agreed with the feminists on.  The juxtaposition of all these will be discussed next week.