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So, I've been #FollowingWomen2017 and it's been enlightening. I've seen things that disturb me and things that deeply help me.
All of that to say something obvious but that doesn't get stated enough: women are fully human. They exhibit all the glory and grime men do.
Perhaps that's obvious. but perhaps it's a tendency to idealize women by some that actually constricts our view of their humanity.
For example, if women are held up as "the fairer sex" in some Victorian, doll-like way, they're actually caricatured rather than known.
And if women are "the fair sex" in that way, then when they either do or say something to the contrary, we actually think they're not women!
Or, they're not being "good women." Which, in the worst form, is another way of saying they're not being ideal human beings.
And there's the fundamental problem: We too often ascribe "ideal human being" status to women and it *de-humanizes them.
We don't do that with men. We allow men to be fully human--which is to say, at once fully glorious and fully grimy, beautiful and broken.
And that little double-standard allows men to get away with a whole host of humanity-denying behaviors and thoughts toward women.
Here's an example that a woman taught me #onhere today: Far too many men think of sex as something they do *to* a woman vs *with* her.
Now ponder that for a moment. Go ahead... take a moment to ponder the difference the preposition makes....
As long as sex--even in marriage--is something a man does *to* a woman vs *with* her it debases the woman in the midst of most intimate act.
As long as sex is something a man does *to* a woman vs. *with* it renders her an object of pleasure and denies her her own.
As long as sex is something a man does *to* a woman vs *with* then we give room for every man to be essentially predatory toward women.
We could go on. I trust you see the point. My thought this morning is that I wouldn't have thought about this were I not #FollowingWomen2017
The ghetto of male-only conversation and learning coupled with male-only access to influence and power is deadly for women.
The combination of ignorance & power frightens me when I think of #Charlottesville and other racist scenes. It should frigthen me for women2
And more than frighten me I'm hoping it helps me stop, listen, ponder, pray and act on behalf of half the human population and sis in Christ
So, who are you listening to nowadays? What are you learning from them? Are any of them women? Okay... back to listening for me.
