I often begin my sermons with a joke. Sarah frequently sends me jokes. Sarah is on the Worship Committee and we recently discussed the reasons that services sometimes run past 11:00.
This week Sarah emailed me one that said: “Words of wisdom: There’s a fine
line between a long, drawn-out sermon and a hostage situation.” (I drop my jaw) When I finished the first draft of this sermon, I remembered Sarah’s joke, and cried. Why didn’t I listen to Sarah?
I appreciate jokes that are relevant to the theme, topic, and messages of the day. Today we’ve celebrated a couple of women who made history. We’ve looked at the effort it took for women to win the right to vote in 1920. Now we’re going to consider the sexism that the 19th amendment overcame.
Sarah sent me another joke: “My husband and I divorced over religious differences,” the woman confided to her pastor. “You see, he thought he was God, and I didn’t.”
Whoo! Right on Sarah! That will preach. We have all been instructed, reared, and conditioned by a society that has claimed that men are more god-like than women. Men at the pinnacle of power in a domination system have been called and treated as gods. From Pharaohs to Roman Emperors to 45, men at the top of a power structure haven’t been held accountable for criminal actions.
Throughout the ages, men have “lorded” over women and other men deemed to be less manly. Religion is one of many social institutions that have justified and enforced male privilege. Rejecting fundamentalism didn’t make us immune from the poisonous pedagogy that shaped our minds and behaviors. The assumption that certain groups are inferior is written into the structures and operations of how we were educated.
Our UU tradition asks us to do the hard work needed to free our minds and
remove our support from social evils. We seek to educate ourselves for this
work. Looking back in history we find our heroes were also not immune to the
prejudices of their day. Although imperfect, UU tradition has created leaders who
advanced causes of liberation, abolition, suffrage, and many forms of social
reform.
Today our readings shone a light upon Margaret Fuller and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. We seek inspiration to challenge oppression, to advance voting rights, or at least curtail the trend of voter suppression. We ask: “What has stood in the way of women gaining an equal voice in society?” Let us start by reflecting on the fact that all forms of oppression contain assertions of the inferiority of a group of people.
Men, if this topic stimulates discomfort, be not afraid. I’m not here to give you hell, or to shame us. We’ve all had enough of that. In their efforts to end patriarchal oppression, some people do seem to speak as if men are the morally inferior sex.
It won’t help to take the inferior label from one group and give it to another. I do want us to get past denial of our privilege and our participation in a system that grants us some favors and requires oppression of women or those deemed to be more like women.
The history and patterns of violence committed by men can be staggering to consider. It may help to remember that we didn’t create the patriarchy. We inherited it.
Although we are not to blame for it, we can take responsibility for our behavior. We have supported and maintained patriarchy by holding on to our advantaged position. Shall we contribute to the continuation of oppression, or do we want to contribute to its correction?
Oppression and domination interfere with the human ability to know the beauty of creation, to understand our interdependence, and to have intimate knowledge of the creative force that connects and gives life to us all. UU religious tradition reminds all of us that faith requires action.
We cannot undo the past. We can strive toward a world where none are oppressed. We can do our part to bring love and justice into this world.
To continue the work of suffragists, we must learn to listen to women. Vicki Luther has helped us today to learn from two inspiring women. Celebrating women’s history is akin to what we did last month when we put a spotlight on Black Resilience and the profound contributions African Americans have made to this country and this world. Let us commit ourselves to continued learning and listening to women.
Regardless of how much work we have done to date, are we willing to make changes, to keep on walking forward?
I believe it will help us to get a look at how oppressive systems live inside us. I wonder if I’m continuing the tradition of men claiming the power to explain how things work. Am I another man talking about men and assuming that my words apply to women? Last week June Hartley shared some wisdom with me. She said “I hope we can accept imperfection, because that is what we are going to get!” Thank you, June. I won’t let the likelihood of making mistakes keep me from giving my effort.
I cherish the gifts I’ve received in healing circles like Deep Listening League. Women, with tears and words, have expressed the pain of living in a society that dismisses women’s experiences. Women you have helped me to see some of the ways you have been discounted, despised, and vilified.
Fuller and Stanton articulated clearly the sexism and the discrimination women have faced. Sexism is the reason that women were denied the right to vote until 1910. The structure of society needed for the voice of women to be silenced. It still does.
Our global system enables the richest people to decide how to use and direct human and natural resources. There are several assumptions that prop up this system:
1. Nature’s law supports competition, not cooperation. 2. It’s unnatural and wrong to interfere with the principle of Spoils to the Victor. 3. An unregulated free market
will best serve humanity. 4. Regulations interfere with the free market. 5.The
richest and most powerful clearly have superior skills for winning in the marketplace, therefore they alone should make the rules.
This system enables those at the top economically to dominate those beneath
them. Individuals and corporations profit while impoverishing the commonwealth by reducing the quality of our air, water, and land as well as social systems that support people’s quality of life.
The silencing of women is crucial for continuation of this oppressive system. The system requires the vast majority of people to be subjugated to the will of the dominant ones. Of all oppressed and subjugated groups, women are the largest, comprising approximately 51% of the population. The majority of people can’t be subjugated unless women are subjugated.
Women’s voices were needed and are needed for democracy to exist. Women and democracy are under attack because the two threaten the domination system. When marginalized people gain agency in the system, they challenge their marginalization. The power of the vote can end the practice of sacrificing human need at the altar of corporate greed.
Democracy is based on the premise of equality. Its intent is a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Our founding fathers (yes, fathers) saw breaking from the king’s rule as progress. Unfortunately, when they declared the equality of all men, they intended to extend most rights only to white landed gentry. Were they bothered by this inconsistency? People are often not bothered by power imbalances when the imbalance is in their favor. It turns out that white landed gentry are not the only people who have the need for agency. Democracy means that constituencies can organize for rights. Thus is the progressive thrust of democracy.
So here we are. Will there be more suffragists? Will society expand voting rights?
Or will the privileges of dictators win out? Can we maintain or create a system that is truly government by the people for the people? Women people? Black people? Gay people? Trans people? Poor people? Can humanity overthrow tyranny of oppression? The answers might depend upon our ability to learn to
listen to women.
Today we heard Ani DiFranco’s words suggest women’s reproductive freedom as a key to world peace. Years ago, I heard Gloria Steinem assert something similar. Steinem said that women’s reproductive rights were the best indicator of a slew of progressive concerns such as environmental record, literacy, percent of deaths in childbirth, poverty levels, and more. I’ve heard similar claims that public education for girls beyond 7th grade was a powerful predictor of so many quality-of-life issues.
Can we learn to listen to women? Will we?
Allow me to speak to the men for a moment. You seem like a progressive bunch. Maybe you voted for Hillary Clinton. Maybe you cheered when Ketanji Brown Jackson became the first black woman to serve on our nation’s Supreme Court. But men, are we willing to consider how deeply the domination system has biased us? Can we admit that we still have a lot to learn about listening to women?
I’m uncomfortable right now as a man wanting to speak of the harm of sexism upon women. I’ve heard women’s stories, read women’s naming of sexism, of the effects of living in a world that devalues women, ignores your cries and your wisdom. You’ve taught me about internalized sexism, the ways that you carry the harmful treatment and messages inside you. Women internalize the messages of sexism. Along with social pressures this has lead women to devalue women too. Studies have shown that both women and men are less likely to attribute leadership qualities to women .
Women, will you accept the call of our UU tradition to challenge the sexism that you have internalized as well as what you witness in society? Have you found it hard to speak up? When you do manage to speak to challenge oppressive systems, do you doubt your thinking? How does the societal conditioning to devalue women come out in your attitudes and behavior? What can we all do to learn not to sell women short?
If it were easy to overcome the intergenerational trauma of sexism, we would have done it already. I believe that the world needs women to lead the way. I don’t say this to eschew our responsibility as men to do our own work. I am saying that humanity seems to be headed for some great suffering and tragic waste of human potential, and that for us to change direction, it will require women to lead!
It seems to me that leading requires continuous learning, some of it quite difficult. I’m asking us to do whatever it takes to become willing to do this work. Women, maybe you think you couldn’t possibly do much about the forces that silence women. Maybe you think you are too old or too whatever. I would like to suggest that such views are the effects of internalized sexism. Internalized sexism enabled millions of women to vote for an unrepentant perpetrator of sexual assault.
Maybe I have a lot of nerve. I hope so. And I hope you do too. I’m not promising that I will always understand, be supportive, or never upset when you do exactly what I said I hope you will do. I’m just passing along that Laurel Thatcher Ulrich quotation: “well behaved women seldom make history.” I’m praying that women will continue to make history or herstory. Sexism is what keeps women from believing they can change the world. I want us all to learn to value women. We need women to learn how to speak up, how to survive the pushback that inevitably targets you. I want women to learn how to
dream big, and how not to be bound to dutifully tending to men’s feelings. I want women to unite because there is power in numbers. And power is needed.
We’ve seen what happens when women dare to not conform or be demure. I’m thinking of Anita Hill, Christine Blasey Ford, and Hillary Clinton. Women, I pray that you find great support, hopefully in this church, that will catch you when you fall, cheer your every victory, and help you to prepare for your next one!
We covenant to accept one another and to encourage spiritual growth. I pray that we find the inspiration, courage, and strength to take our next steps, to do our own work, and the work we can do together.
I pray that we will all remain willing to learn. I pray we have the courage to speak up, do hard things, and survive the backlash. I’m praying we remember that we stand on the shoulders of sheroes. And because we personally may not get to the promised land, I pray that we make peace and love and happiness on the journey.
We can celebrate how far we’ve come, without settling. We need each other and find inspiration from whatever sources so that we won’t get too discouraged by temporary setbacks, that we keep holding our chin up and walk humbly with our G*d, acting justly as we keep learning and stop to eat and rest and party along the way. In the spirit of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and all suffragists, march on, dance on, rock on! I love you all!
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