A word to Rush Limbaugh. Baloney.

After listening to his tirade blaming feminists and women generally for Anthony Weiner’s poor choices, he has now affirmed for me what I have always suspected. He is a mean-spirited, ideologue jock with a gift for gab and business.  Kudos to him for the latter and shame on him for the former.

Yes, I know he was responding to Claire Shipman’s comments on This Week with Christiana Anampour, and yes I know the This Week segment seemed to say that if more women were in positions of public and private sector authority the world would be a better place, but really…. do two wrongs make a right?

It’s not about male versus female.  Isn’t it time we got past the “us or them” mentality that has brought humanity to the brink of its own destruction?  Just how much havoc do we have to wreak before we get it?

Like everything else in life it’s about balance.

Limbaugh is stuck in the 70’s. Consequently, his reaction is understandable.   Feminism was a reaction to 5000+ years of what author Riane Eisler calls in her book The Chalice and The Blade “dominator social systems.” Dominator systems are based on aggression, domination and exploitation.  They are maintained through fear.  Think subjugation, slavery, slaughter, Inquisition, crucifixion, burning at the stake, gas ovens, atomic bombs, and terrorism. The list is, sadly, endless.

We’ve had 5000+ years of dominator driven advice and rule because men have done the advising and the ruling.  Are they inherently bad? No. Do they need to be more in balance? Yes.  Is partnership with women the answer? Partly.

You see, it’s not a simple as gender.  If women rise to positions of power, only to act like men when they get there, then women will be part of the problem rather than part of the solution.

The solution is social systems wherein both women and men contribute their inherently unique characteristics, and God-given gifts, so that together they are able to achieve something greater than either could achieve on their own.

Getting to this realization and then exhibiting an openness to explore the possibilities is the key here.  Both genders have some hurdles to jump if they hope to be successful.  Men will have to moderate their propensity for aggression (testosterone driven) and women will have to moderate their propensity for emotionalism (estrogen).

But think of it.  If these two forces of Nature can first bring themselves into balance, then join with the other in a balanced union and effort, imagine the possibilities. I think we have to imagine the possibilities.

At this point, imagining the alternative is just too scary.

 

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