STILL FORSAKING MOTHER EARTH ? . . .
Today, Washington, Wall Street, Corporate and Big Tech is 80+% men. Currently — July 2021, the US Senate so threatened by the feminizing and browning of this country they’re holding Democracy and these dis-uniting states to ransom. And no, this is not an attack on all men. Far from it! But it is tagging the entrenched capitalistic privileged white patriarchy and the self-serving power and status-seeking of the men-on-top who are so effectively ignoring ‘we the people’. In the process perpetuating environmental injustice, diminishing equality and fueling existential climate-change so much of which is based on the exploitation inherent in systemic racism, to say nothing of from the natural resources and elements of our forsaken Mother Earth. Yes Black do indeed lives matter as do the Indigenous peoples from whom we Europeans shamefully stole this continent and whose matrilineal values understand humanity in the context of the embodied opposites of our existence....spirit and matter.
If we accept that (historically at least) men are biologically built to lead, to dominate, to be strong, to inseminate, to ensure our species’ survival...hmm...then today they’re not doing so well! Perhaps, as a Men’s Movement leader, way back when in the 8o’s Dr. Sam Keen was wont to put it “when we men unzip our flies, our brains fall out” calls for a review to update and modify that programing of expected roles as “protectors and providers”. In these days of gender flexibility, many women are that too though our biology still means most of us still more bodily vulnerable —still built to bleed, to attract, to conceive, to give birth, breast-feed, care take and nurture.
That said, homo-sapiens stellar progress today is based on eons of daring and discovery and men’s bold and brilliant exploration, calculation, construction, invention, innovation which has given us language, banking, the law, engineering, electricity, radar, rockets, cars, trains, boats and planes along with AI’s dehumanizing data-driven future. With it —for better and worse— our accelerating flexibility, mobility, comfort, complicity, complacency and the ease, speed, and luxury and consumption of today’s fossil-fueled “Petroculture”.
The ongoing primal and predominantly masculine drive for power and control has materialized by fighting for, or defending turf, thus to kill or be killed. Not to forget during this time of peace (?) we take so easily for granted it’s a result of centuries of conflict and war when (rightly or wrongly) millions of (mostly) men have, and still do, sacrifice life and limb. As that basic tribal impulse to attack and divide necessitates the denial of our mutual humanity, civility and commonality — how else could the patriarchal impulse have been motivated to undertake historically punishing and lethal tasks had we women not been kept silent with no choice but to buy into our subservient role.
No surprise then, in innate response to fear, testosterone-fueled competitiveness, violence and risk-taking is found more in the brains and hormones of men than women and pro-social, oxytocin-enhanced feelings of empathy and relatedness — and with it more ethics* —- more predominant in women than men. (*see Dr. Paul Zak). These basic physiological facts actually offer us reasons to forgive ourselves and each other. A better understanding of the origins of our culturally conditioned patterns of power-dynamics within the script we’ve unconsciously introjected & which neuroscience reflects explains much about the reasons why, and....that with this knowing that we can change!
Acknowledging the roots of our limited individual and collective consciousness which has enabled our outdated polarizing political systems to remain so unquestioned is pivotal to integrating this new understanding and encourage frank and open conversations between women and men, and the young and old. As women’s progress increasingly threatens the status-quo’s self styled supremacy, it is ours to recognize why patterns of dominance are still rooted in primitive imprints of mammalian history and anatomy. It is for us all to accept and appreciate all our similarities and — thankfully — our differences too, and move on together harmoniously from here.
Has this protracted covid pandemic reignited Trump’s psychopathic extremes thus sabotaging the necessary regenerative transition of Biden? It is harrowing what January 6th indicates about the ongoing predation and arrogance of toxic masculinity that many good men— and women and children — continue to suffer from may not be over. Increasingly, young people today are crucial catalysts for vital systemic change an they deserve our total support. Here’s to their rebelling against our extinction and putting an end to the tiny minority of male oligarchs who monopolize the world. And time is now for more women and whatever gender any of us are to speak up and out forcefully. Enough of we women buying into the game and objectifying of ourselves with 8” heels, skin-tight clothes and cleavage, and instead use our persuasion to collaborate and cooperate and keep the faith in the best of the relatedness inherent in the Feminine principles of interdependence within all of us and in the natural bonds within human nature.
Yes, a call to all of us — to good men and women alike — to heed the signals and respect and give voice to the unquantifiable human qualities of love and interconnectedness and caring common to us all. To do it for ourselves, for each other, for our children — and for Mother Earth — before we have no choice but to escape this little Blue Planet and head for Mars or the Moon again — c/o Bransom, Bezos and Musk’s “Big Fuckin’ Rockets” !
