bonegatherer wrote:
You are so on point. Also it's interesting what you said about how older women, widows, are treated:

Barbara Walker in the Crone talks about the deep unconscious roots of this behavior:

"The basic fear of any young mammal is abandonment by the caretaking mother, on whom it is totally dependent.....to be rejected by her is to die.."

"Women's most feared powér over men is the powér to say no...so nearly all rules for feminine behavior are aimed at immobilizing each woman..so she can have no economic, sexual, or intellectual freedom to say no."

The Archetype of "the all powérful mother who embodied the fearful potential for rejection, abandonment and death." It is considered a dárk feminine aspect of the triple goddess. One that society is not comfortable with because it cómes down to a fear of death! "Ancient cyclic images of the cosmos necessarily recognized a recessive period in every cycle.." Walker gets at the sexism is a tremendous effort to really deny the "negative" archetype of the Crone, the Mother that can destroy whereas in most ancient cultures it was seen merely as a part of life..a necessary part.

"..images of women are often identified with images of death...vagina dentata..Moslems had so much secret fear of the mouthlike vulva, which they called "insatiable", that by extension they also labeled women's mouths obscene..."

"She who introduced life also introduced death. Karmic balance ruled the cyclic patterns of female-oriented religions....This naturalistic world vision was pushed aside by rising patriarchal religions, which were basically antinature, viewing all flesh as sinful and all death as punishment rather than universal recycling process.."

"The Crone was the most powérful of the Goddess's three personae...Until the Crone figure was suppressed, patriarchal religions could not achieve full control..Our culture's official rejection of the Crone was related to rejection of women, particularly elder women. The gray-haired hígh priestesses, once respected tribal matriarchs...were transformed into minions of the devil."

We don't have the witch trials anymore but.."modern society does eliminate elder women in a sense. They are made invisible."..signs of old womanhood are not supposed to be seen." But once.."elder women were seen as founts of wisdom, law and healing skills." even more powérful in her "years of wisdom" because she now held in all the powérful "wiseblood" she once released every month.

"Later in life she functíoned naturally as wisewoman, healer, judge and most of all functíoned as the Crone:funerary priestess and Death Mother, controlling the circumstances of death as she controlled those of birth." That's interesting to me because I see that out here amongst the Native American tribes. When someone dies it is always and only the women, the older women, that must get together, clean and prepare the body for burial. These also are the same ones that reside over midwife duties.

There's alot more, but basically she attributes the historical poor treatment of women and particularly elder women as a reaction to a subconscious fear of The Crone and see her symbol in women and elder women. It is a fear of complete death and a desire to control it, deny it..a perspective that views existence that way as opposed to the view that it is all cyclic..life, death, rebirth. She is always "Becoming"; never a state of stasis.

Whereas we've now been trained to see death..and that goes for any type of "transformation" as an end, we once viewed it as simply another beginning and, I think, this shift in perspective has wrought serious problems throughout the world and human civilization.


Hi Karen

I feel you are right on this, but the roots of this mindset go back possibly thousands of years, and if it hasn't changed in all this time, then it could be hundreds more years before it does, even though the youth are stirring, the demonizing of women in these cultures are ingrained into the consciousness. It hurts my heart to think about how these women are treated.

Pen