Tag Archives: Female-Centered Societies

A Woman-Centered Economy! Replacing the Male-Dominated Economy (Part 2)

The War Against Subsistence

The capitalist, colonizing patriarchy is doing everything it can to control that choice. This global system does not want anyone, global South or North, to have “an independent subsistence”. As Mies and Bennholdt-Thomsen explain:

“Ivan Illich stated as long ago as 1982 that the war against subsistence is the real war of capital, not the struggle against the unions and their wage demands. Only after people’s capacity to subsist is destroyed, are they totally and unconditionally in the power of capital.” (p. 19, Subsistence Perspective, Maria Mies and Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen)

African campaign for farmer control of seeds

In the global South vast numbers of people from the countryside have been forced from their lands and subsistence-based ways of life as result of centuries of colonization, international development policies, land and water grabs, loss of land due to climate and ecological disasters, and corporate/state pressures on peasant farmers.

In the global North over a century of economic pressures on small farmers, propaganda campaigns portraying rural life as backwards and the industrialization of agriculture have pushed many farm families off their lands.[2] Today the “service” economy is busily eating away at the subsistence economy, as people pay for all kinds of things they used to get from their communities, do for themselves or not do at all, including “treating themselves” to toenail and fingernail manicures, socializing on social media, getting tattoos, and eating at fast food restaurants, to name a few.

The capitalist economy is colonizing and commercializing both the Earth and the subsistence economy in its endless quest for profit and wealth for the few. Resistance is strong in the global South, but people in the global North are far more under the control of capital, due to our loss of “an independent subsistence.”

The capitalist economy is colonizing and commercializing both the Earth and the subsistence economy in its endless quest for profit and wealth for the few.[3] Resistance is strong in the global South, but people in the global North are far more under the control of capital, due to our loss of “an independent subsistence.”

Putting Women at the Center

Still, the woman-centered economy beckons. Every day women (and men) in the industrialized world get to choose the economy they want over and over again. Eat out (capitalism) or cook dinner (subsistence). Plant kale or buy it at Wal-Mart. Walk the dog or hire a dog walker. Through making one choice at a time women (and men) can gradually diminish our dependency on and support for the male-dominated economy.

Red Russian kale Putting women at the center of an economy prevents men from taking more than their share of power and ensures a balance between women and men. Woman-centered does not imply woman-dominated. Women in subsistence economies (and elsewhere) generally create caring and sharing relationships that are non-hierarchical.

Our individual choices give us power in our own lives, but subsistence economies are created by communities of people giving to and receiving from each other and the Earth. The giving of gifts begins with the gifts of the Earth and the gifts of human mothers. As Robin Wall Kimmerer has explained, a natural human response to “a world made of gifts”, the abundance of nature, is to also give, give to the Earth and to each other.[4] Among humans, gift giving comes very naturally since human infants are dependent on the care – gifts – of our biological and social mothers. According to Genevieve Vaughan, this one-way mother/child gifting relationship forms the basis of a maternal gift economy where all relationships are based in gifts, not exchanges.[5]

Subsistence economies are based in the giving of gifts, though some, perhaps the more stratified and patriarchal ones, may include barter, trade, cash and markets while still making the well-being of everyone in the community the central concern.[6] In many subsistence-based societies women participate in local markets in order to share surpluses from subsistence production and gain power and prestige within their communities.[7] Increasingly, feminists interested in a return to subsistence and maternal gift economies are acknowledging the connections between the two.[8] Perhaps a better name for the subsistence economy would be the “subsistence/gift economy.”

Daughters of Belitis picnic, 1959, Bay Area
The capitalist economy isolates people and destroys community. Both gift giving and subsistence-based relations create deep bonds and community. As female-centered economies grow, we can expect communities to grow and strengthen too. With a central place in the economy, women’s place in community should follow suit.

We can choose to create community at the same time we choose the subsistence/gift economy over capitalism. Yes, cook dinner instead of eating out AND invite family, friends or neighbors. Plant kale, eat it yourself AND give some away. Do this within the community you belong to or intentionally begin creating the community you want.

A Plan for Transformation

Despite the climate and larger ecological emergencies unfolding, this dominant society is not even attempting to create a plan that would make the radical (meaning root) transformations necessary to halt these disasters. Such a plan would have to recognize the need to bring capitalism, growth, male dominance and all domination to an end. This the power holders in the global society cannot and will not even consider.

Despite the climate and larger ecological emergencies unfolding, this dominant society is not even attempting to create a plan that would make the radical (root) transformations necessary to halt these disasters. Such a plan would have to recognize the need to bring capitalism, growth, male dominance and all domination to an end. This the power holders in the global society cannot and will not even consider.

As Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen has explained, these times call for new strategies to create social change:

“In view of the social power structures of our era, the old quandary of whether “we” should abolish the plundering capitalist system or whether “we” – since there is no time for systemic issues – should concentrate on reforms, has become obsolete. What matters now is that we – all sovereign individuals capable of acting responsibly – withdraw from the forced maximization economy by refusing to participate.”[9]

A very promising option available to those in the global North who want radical transformation is constructive resistance, the use of actions that work to both upend capitalist, colonizing patriarchy and, at the same time, create alternatives. Reclaiming and expanding woman-centered economies is constructive resistance. Every move into the female-centered economy is a move out of the male-dominated economy. Because capitalism is dependent on growth (to avoid recession, depression, collapse), it depends on women’s (and other consumers’) participation.[10] Think back to George W. Bush’s response to 9/11. Here in the U.S. we were told to go shopping!

Every move into the female-centered economy is a move out of the male-dominated economy. Because capitalism is dependent on growth (to avoid recession, depression, collapse), it depends on women’s (and other consumers’) participation.

The male-dominated economy has an Achilles’ heel. The growth of the woman-centered economy is the dart that can slow it down and, over time, bring it to an end. Talk of ending the economy that so many people now depend on sniffs of disaster, yet so does the continuation of that economy. An alternative way to meet everyone’s needs must be created. That alternative is the subsistence/gift economy! The shift to this woman-centered economy opens the door to the creation of fully woman-centered communities and societies that do away with domination.

30 million were affected by floods in Pakistan last summer Why not switch to the female-centered economy and scrap the male-dominated one? Clearly, the male-dominated economy that is bringing us climate catastrophe, forced migrations and the Sixth Extinction is far scarier than the subsistence/gift economy that exists only to bring us life. In the global South, people have been fighting to continue their own ways of life, which includes their subsistence economies, since the beginnings of colonization. Choosing to embrace and expand woman-centered economies offers those in the global North another way to step up by moving into an Earth-centered way of life and curtailing support for the economy of destruction.

If you are still troubled by thoughts of what you might have to give up as the male-dominated economy winds down, consider this. Yes, subsistence economies provide the essentials of life, not the “extras.” But, there can be more than one economy, a mix of economies, within any society. Why not have two female-centered economies? Caring for the well-being of all Earth and human communities must be the priority, but as the earth recovers, woman-centered economies providing “wants” may evolve and co-exist with subsistence economies.

Gardening and Eating: A First Step

Industrial agriculture is terrible for the Earth.[11] We have to eat! Industrial agriculture – a central part of the male-dominated economy – must be replaced and we can look to the woman-centered economy for the replacement.

Mountain Mother is calling me and it’s spring so the earthworms and the garden are calling extra loud. If you listen, you will probably hear them too. Not everyone is physically able to garden, but everyone can probably find a way to make sure their food scraps feed the earthworms and restore the soil.

With most women (and men) in the U.S. spending so little time gardening (average is under 1 ½ hours a week for women) there is a great opportunity to expand home food production. This expansion could happen really quickly, as it did during both World Wars when the U.S. government encouraged people to plant victory gardens. In 1943, 20 million victory gardens produced 10 billion pounds of food.

Hello earthworms! Creating home and community gardens and small farms can restore the Earth and restore us. There is plenty of work to be done besides the actual gardening, including garden planning, learning about insects, seed saving, cooking and preserving foods and much more. As we become deeply connected to the plant world, our relationships with the life-giving soils and ever-changing winds and waters will grow too. These kinds of deep and real connections can transform our lives, including even our desires and what we think we need. Stepping away from the cell phones and all the rest of the constant bombardment of modern society and slowing down to nature’s pace can open up such a different and awesome world that everything changes, inside and out.

This reminds me of one last insight from Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen:

“Decommercialization is first and foremost an attitude of mind. Orienting ourselves not to money, but to what we actually need puts all decisions in a new light. Modern insatiability can be replaced by the satisfaction of having a need fulfilled.”[12]

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Notes

1. “inequality within countries has also been growing and some commentators now talk of a ‘Global North’ and a ‘Global South’ referring respectively to richer or poorer communities which are found both within and between countries. For example, whilst India is still home to the largest concentration of poor people in a single nation it also has a very sizable middle class and a very rich elite.” More info here.
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2. Maria Mies and Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen, The Subsistence Perspective, p. 17-19.
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3. “Money or Life? What Really Makes Us Rich” by Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen in Climate Chaos: Ecofeminism and the Land Question edited by Ana Isla, 2019.
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4. “Mishkos Kenomagwen, The Lessons of Grass” by Robin Wall Kimmerer in Traditional Ecological Knowledge: Learning from Indigenous Practices for Environmental Sustainability edited by Melissa K. Nelson and Dan Shilling, 2018
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5. Genevieve Vaughan, For-Giving: A Feminist Criticism of Exchange, 1997.
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6. For example, Mies and Bennholdt-Thomsen described how a peasant and craft economy functioned as late as the 1960s in the German village of Borgentreich. Peasants traded their farm products for the goods and services of local craftspeople: blacksmiths, dressmakers, bakers, carpenters and so on. Cash payments were only required when the craftsperson had to buy materials (e.g. fabric) and needed to replace the cash they had spent. But, not every person could pay. Then as Mies and Bennholdt-Thomsen report:
“After waiting in vain, the craftsman would sometimes go to the farmer and pick up a couple of sacks of rye or seed, or maybe a few piglets. But, as one master joiner put it, ‘We also simply forgot about a lot of it.’ The baker said that most people paid their bills at the end of the year, but ‘those who hadn’t a penny to their name got their bread for nothing; in the end you couldn’t just let people starve.’” From Maria Mies and Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen, The Subsistence Perspective, p. 88-89.
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7. Maria Mies and Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen, The Subsistence Perspective, p. 109-110.
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8. For example, Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen includes a discussion of the maternal gift economy in her 2019 article “Money or Life? What Really Makes Us Rich” published in the Climate Chaos anthology edited by Ana Isla.
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9. “Money or Life? What Really Makes Us Rich” by Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen in Climate Chaos: Ecofeminism and the Land Question edited by Ana Isla, 2019. p. 55.
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10. David Holmgren, one of the founders of permaculture, suggests in his article “Crash on Demand” that permaculture activists could initiate a financial crash by reducing consumption and that this could bring about desperately needed societal and ecological changes. Holmgren’s ideas are very interesting, yet have received sharp criticism from some because of the effects a financial crash would have on humans. I am suggesting a gentler approach than Holmgren in which the growth of the subsistence economy would supply people with what we need to live as the capitalist economy (and the damages created by it) diminish through reduced participation. Withdrawing from the capitalist economy and is a matter of ethics! In either Holmgren’s scenario or the one I am suggesting, the actions of a relatively small portion of the populace could have a large effect because of capitalism’s fragility.
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11. Industrial agriculture is not only a major contributor to climate change, but also fuels habitat loss, the biodiversity crisis, freshwater drawdown, pollution and more. For an introduction to these issues, check this out
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12. “Money or Life? What Really Makes Us Rich” by Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen in Climate Chaos: Ecofeminism and the Land Question edited by Ana Isla, 2019. p. 60.

A Woman-Centered Economy! Replacing the Male-Dominated Economy (Part 1)

What is Subsistence?

Mies and Bennholdt-Thomsen provide us with a simple definition of what they call “subsistence production” or “production of life” saying that this “includes all work that is expended in the creation, re-creation and maintenance of immediate life and which has no other purpose.” (p. 20, The Subsistence Perspective) The fact that subsistence economies have “no other purpose” is key to distinguishing the subsistence economy from capitalist and state run economies. That “other purpose” is profit, the creation of wealth for a few (mostly men) at the expense of the well being (and perhaps the survival) of the Earth and human society.

Graph showing large size of women's economy It is important to understand the importance and the size of the subsistence economy. Genevieve Vaughan recently discussed research from D. Ironmonger and F. Soupourmas showing that unpaid household work, called “gross household product”, would have cost $11.6 trillion in 2011, if wages had been paid.[3] Compare this to the $15.6 trillion figure for Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2011. Even in a highly developed country, the U.S., the subsistence economy is a multi-trillion dollar economy almost as large as the market economy! This economy is critical to the continuation of life and human society and women’s work is central to it.

Despite the magnitude and importance of this woman-centered economy, over the past couple of centuries more and more women have joined the male-dominated economy as wage workers and business owners (while also continuing to do subsistence work). There are many reasons for this movement, including economic need, sexism, feminism and the much higher status accorded the male-dominated economy. There has been a “war against subsistence” at work here, as I’ll discuss in Part 2 of this blog. For now, please keep in mind that status is given and taken away by society and there is no reason to think that the work done for the “other purpose” of money in the male-dominated economy is in any way superior to subsistence work.

What Makes the Subsistence Economy Woman-Centered?

Creation of Life (Biological Reproduction): Women are the creators of human life. The work that only women can do bearing, birthing and nursing children is a key part of what makes subsistence a woman-centered economy. While men have a necessary role in biological reproduction it is fleeting and small compared to pregnancy and giving birth. The continuation of human life is utterly dependent on women, even where capitalist or state economies now sometimes play a (profitable) role through provision of reproductive technologies, doctors and hospitals.

Maintaining Life (Social Reproduction): Raising children is likewise critical to the continuation of human societies. Since this is social, not biological work, men often participate. Nonetheless, across countless societies and historical eras much of the work of nurturing and socialization has fallen to women. This is essential subsistence work carried out primarily by women and a key part of what makes subsistence a woman-centered society.

Across countless societies and historical eras much of the work of nurturing and socialization has fallen to women. This is essential subsistence work carried out primarily by women and a key part of what makes subsistence a woman-centered society.

It isn’t just idle speculation to say that it is mostly women raising children. The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) collects data every year on how many “household hours” per week women and men spend doing child care (on average). Yes, women do much more child care! In 2018 we spent about 33 hours per week when unemployed and just a little less (30 hours) when employed.[4] The comparable numbers for men were about 23 household hours (unemployed) and 18 (employed). (In actuality, women and men with young children spend many more hours doing childcare than the BEA reports. The BEA numbers are based on averaging data from all U.S. households, including those that have no children or only older children who require much less care.[5]) Please notice that the BEA statistics do not have anything to say about the quality of childcare provided by men, as compared to women.

Zora, our dog, could walk herself since we live so far off road Maintaining life involves much more than socializing the next generation and women do much of this maintenance work too, even in the global North. You don’t have to have children to play a central role in running a household. For example, do you cook meals? Clean your house? Care for other members of your household when they are sick? Walk the dog? Do yard work? Sew buttons back on your clothes when they fall off? Keeping a household going can involve seemingly endless work and women do much of it! This is true even in households that have many modern “conveniences.”

Women do even more work maintaining households in non-industrial societies where their livelihoods are more fully tied into the subsistence economy. This work can include tasks such as: processing and preserving of food from gardens or fields, carrying water, butchering, house building, weaving textiles, processing hides, making fishnets, manufacturing clothing, making pottery and many other crafts. In non-industrial societies women’s household maintenance work is likely to be higher where men have taken over more of the work of food production.[6]

Maintaining Life: Subsistence Production of Food: Despite all the work described above, in many non-industrial societies women can be heavily involved in subsistence production of food. In a 1986 article in American Anthropologist, Alice Schlegel and Herbert Barry documented the extent of women’s contribution to subsistence food production in 186 non-industrial societies. While men contributed more than women overall, in about half of the 186 societies women did over 35% of the food production. The researchers considered women’s contribution to be high when it reached this level (35%). Women were especially likely to make a high contribution to production in societies that used simple technologies to gather or grow plant food (high contribution in 70% of these societies). This is in stark contrast to societies based primarily in hunting of animals (high contribution in just 13% of these societies).[7]

Backyard chickens We can’t include anyone’s production work from the capitalist economy (in jobs, as business owners) in these considerations as that work isn’t subsistence work and cuts into time available for subsistence work.[8] Today, women make up a major portion of the paid work force.[9] Still, some women in heavily industrialized societies do garden or keep chickens or other livestock for home (subsistence) use. According to the BEA, in 2018 men in the U.S. did a little more home gardening than women (The rough averages in the U.S. are 1 ½ to 2 ½ hours for men, ½ to 1 ¼ hours for women.)

Women in industrialized societies who want to participate more in the women’s economy could work fewer hours at jobs. Traditionally, women have been the gatherers of plants and were the inventors of agriculture. One avenue women could take to reclaim power would be in developing close relationships with and knowledge of the plant peoples. We could become gatherers, gardeners, seed collectors, tenders of the wild, herbalists or subsistence farmers. As has traditionally been the case in some subsistence economies, surpluses can be taken to market for barter or to obtain cash.[10]

Thanks to capitalist, colonizing patriarchy, we are facing an uncertain future where women and their local communities may need to take very seriously the need to focus on providing basic necessities like plant foods and medicine. The food sovereignty movement is important for the global North, not just the global South.

Subsistence is a Woman-Centered Economy

Let’s take stock of all the work creating and maintaining life that women do, as discussed here:

Almost all the biological reproduction PLUS
Most of the child raising PLUS
Most of the household maintenance PLUS
For nonindustrial societies, a very significant chunk of the food production.

Without women’s contributions there would be no subsistence economy and, indeed, no human society or life at all. Subsistence is a woman-centered economy!

In Part 2 of this blog, coming soon, we’ll talk about how choosing the women’s economy can bring the male-dominated economy to an end, while at the same time providing for humanity’s needs.

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Footnotes

1. Lorraine Edwalds and Midge Stocker edited a very interesting anthology, The Woman-Centered Economy: Ideals, Reality, and the Space Between in 1995. This feminist anthology was more focused on creating and supporting a woman-centered economy within the existing market economy and did not have an emphasis on subsistence. There is the possibility of conjuring up multiple woman-centered economies, as I will discuss in Part 2 of this blog.
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2. “[I]nequality within countries has also been growing and some commentators now talk of a ‘Global North’ and a ‘Global South’ referring respectively to richer or poorer communities which are found both within and between countries. For example, whilst India is still home to the largest concentration of poor people in a single nation it also has a very sizable middle class and a very rich elite.” For more info.
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3. Genevieve Vaughan provided the $11.6 trillion figure for 2011 in her talk at the 2022 Maternal Gift Economy Conference. The reference she gave was for a 2012 article by D. Ironmonger and F. Soupourmas. I have not been able to locate that article as I do not have a university affiliation.
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4. The numbers I report come from my reading of the BEA graphs and are as accurate as I could make them, but please consider them rough figures.
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5. The BEA did not include detailed information on their methodology with their graphs. They say: “our estimates cover the entire economy, and most households do not have minor children present. According to the 2020 Annual Social and Economic Supplement of the Current Population Survey, 40 percent of households had children under 18. Only half of those (21 percent of total households) had children under 13, the ages that require the most direct child care.” If 79% of the households included in the BEA statistics do not have children requiring substantial amounts of care (ie. children under 13), then parents with young children must be doing far more work that the figures they provide and that I have referred to.
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6. See p. 145 in “The Cultural Consequences of Female Contribution to Subsistence” by Alice Schlegel and Herbert Barry. In American Anthropologist, V. 88, 1986. You can access the full article for free if you register as an individual on Jstor.
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7. See Table 1 on p. 144 for data on women’s contribution to subsistence in societies with various forms of subsistence. “The Cultural Consequences of Female Contribution to Subsistence” by Alice Schlegel and Herbert Barry. In American Anthropologist, V. 88, 1986. You can access the full article for free if you register as an individual on Jstor.
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8. See p. 14 in Ecological Revolutions: Nature, Gender, and Science in New England by Carolyn Merchant, University of North Carolina Press,1989.
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9. Labor force participation rates for U.S. women are 57% and 68% for men, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. According to the International Labor Organization the current global labour force participation rate for women is just under 47%. For men, it’s 72%.
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10. See p. 70 in “Money or Life? What Really Makes Us Rich” by Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen. In Climate Chaos: Ecofeminism and the Land Question edited by Ana Isla, Innana Publications, 2019.

Coming Back to Mountain Mother

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By Jeanne F. Neath

Mountain Mother, I hear you calling me.
Mountain Mother, we hear your cry.
Mountain Mother, we have come back to you.
Mountain Mother, we hear your sigh.
Lyrics by Carol P. Christ [1], Sung to tune of “Ancient Mother” (origin unknown)

What do a bunch of feminist women do while riding a tour bus around the Mediterranean island of Crete? If they are on the Goddess Pilgrimage started by Carol Christ over 20 years ago, they sing songs honoring the Goddess. The song that drew me most from the first time I heard it on the fall 2022 Goddess Pilgrimage was “Mountain Mother.” Not surprising since the rocky, sparsely vegetated, yet hauntingly beautiful mountains of Crete surrounded us much of the time as our trusty bus wound its way up and down and around the island. The Pilgrimage leaders regularly pointed out double mountain peaks, suggestive of women’s breasts and therefore sacred to the ancient matriarchal peoples of Crete.

We were traveling to experience various sites sacred to the ancient Minoan culture, a matriarchal civilization that thrived on Crete from 3000 BCE to 1450 BCE when Mycenaeans from the Greek mainland invaded. We trekked through the stone ruins of large sacred centers such as Knossos and Phaistos (called “palaces” by patriarchally-inclined archaeologists) and climbed up to mountain peaks and caves that were once ritual sites of the Minoan people. We swam and lazed on sandy and stony beaches on the Cretan and Libyan seas where Minoan ships once sailed on trading missions to nearby Africa, Asia and Europe. We even visited Christian churches now standing on the same grounds that once drew the Minoan people to celebrate the Goddess.

Our two and a half weeks on Crete were enlightening, at times awe-inspiring and, perhaps most of all, challenging for two 70+ year old women. Paula dislocated and broke her left shoulder on the first day of the Pilgrimage and continued on the tour anyway with her arm in a sling. I became both personal attendant and pilgrim. I climbed up rough paths to sacred mountain peaks and caves. Near the top of Mt. Juktas, the peak sanctuary of ritual importance to the ancient Minoan pilgrims of Knossos, I braved a wild wind that was so powerful and so erratic I had to deeply concentrate on every step I took to stay in control of where my foot would land. The trail we were following was a little too close to the mountain’s edge for my comfort in these conditions. At the Libyan Sea on the south coast of the island overwhelming waves knocked me off my feet repeatedly as I attempted and finally succeeded in moving from the shallows into deeper waters.

Juktas peak sanctuary

Despite all this, I’ve encountered what is perhaps my biggest challenge now that I am home again, here in the Ozarks.

I have left the mountains of Crete behind, almost certainly forever. Going on pilgrimage to Crete was the only time I have ever flown overseas and, for many reasons, I doubt I will ever fly anywhere again. Yet, the “Mountain Mother” song is staying with me, playing over and over again in my head. I am even singing it out loud to myself, despite the fact that I am one of those people who can’t ever stick to the tune.

The mountains here in the Ozarks are very different than the ones in Crete – not so high and ours are covered by an oak hickory forest. When we got home from Crete after over 24 hours of listening to jet engines and sitting in airports, I was immensely relieved to be back in ‘our’ verdant mountains, with all the familiar sights and sounds. I couldn’t help but hear and feel these Ozark mountains calling me: “Mountain Mother, I hear you calling me.” I had in no way left the Goddess of the Minoans behind me.

I couldn’t help but hear and feel these Ozark mountains calling me: “Mountain Mother, I hear you calling me.” I had in no way left the Goddess of the Minoans behind me.

Carol P. Christ, the now deceased author of the “Mountain Mother” lyrics and the founder of the Goddess Pilgrimage to Crete, wrote in the preface to her book, Rebirth of the Goddess:

“…the Goddess is the power of intelligent embodied love that is the ground of all being. The earth is the body of the Goddess.” (p. xv)

If the earth is the body of the Goddess – and I like thinking of both the Goddess and the Earth this way – then what does it mean to be promising, “Mountain Mother, we have come back to you.”? Is this just a spiritual commitment that entails embracing the Goddess or another Earth-connected spirituality? Or are we talking about material reality – coming back to the Earth herself – too?

The obvious answer to these questions from the perspective of any Earth-based spirituality is both. The very idea of a dichotomy (dualism) between spirit and nature originates in the patriarchal worldview of the Western world. As Carol Christ explained:

“…neither the history nor the contemporary meaning of the Goddess can be understood unless we develop holistic modes of thinking, abandoning the categorical distinctions between ‘God’, ‘man’, and ‘the world’ and transforming the classical dualisms of spirit and nature, mind and body, rational and irrational, male and female, that have structured the worldview we know as western thought.” (p. xiv, Rebirth of the Goddess)

According to C. Christ the spiritual understandings of a culture – its mythos or “culturally shared system of symbols and rituals that defines what is real and valuable” – are deeply connected to the way of life of that culture – its ethos. She explains:

“A mythos supports an ethos, telling us that certain ways of living and acting are appropriate because they put us in touch with what is real and valuable” (p. 160, Rebirth of the Goddess)

And,

“Conversely, the living of an ethos reinforces the sense that the mythos to which it is connected is true” (p. 160, Rebirth of the Goddess)

When I sing “Mountain Mother, we have come back to you” I am embracing the symbols and rituals, feelings and understandings of a Goddess/Earth-centered spirituality, but at the same time I am reaching for an altered way of living that brings me and others back to the Earth, “Mountain Mother”, in very real physical ways.

Our mountains in the Ozarks

Here is that “biggest challenge” I mentioned earlier. I’ve spent most of a lifetime working to change my own ways of living and the way of life promoted and enforced by the capitalist, colonizing patriarchy that is dominating the Earth. Yet, can I truthfully say to Mountain Mother that I have come back to her? That I have already come back to her?

Can I truthfully say to Mountain Mother that I have come back to her? That I have already come back to her?

Paula and I watched one of the recent online Maternal Gift Economy salons and I was delighted when some of the speakers brought up the need to “exit the market” economy and live within the gift (and, I would say also, subsistence) economy. As things stand now in the dominant society, many, many people have been made dependent on the market economy for their basic physical needs. Corporate influences largely determine people’s “wants”, as well.

A key part of the needed transformation of society is to end the dependency on the market by returning to a gift (and subsistence) relationship with the Earth where our human gifts to the Earth would include great care for Her, great care of Her. If we want to come back to Mountain Mother, then receiving our sustenance directly from the gifts of the land and waters we live on is of primary importance, as is the physical care we give to the land and waters that are our home. Our own roots to the land can become deep like the trees living with us on Mountain Mother.

Of course, we don’t have to do all this alone. Other women (and men) are returning to Mountain Mother too and coming to live and work, at least in part, outside the market economy. We strengthen our women’s (and other) communities as each member uses the gifts from the Earth to create more gifts (e.g. making jam from native huckleberries) that then circulate within our communities.

A key part of the needed transformation of society is to end the dependency on the market by returning to a gift (and subsistence) relationship with the Earth where our human gifts to the Earth would include great care for Her, great care of Her.

I hope you aren’t finding talk of the gift/subsistence economy intimidating. Everyone on earth already participates in that economy! We are born into it and rely on it every day. When our mothers give birth to us, they are not paid to do this. Instead they are giving us the gift of life. When we cook dinner for friends or family members or they cook dinner for us we are participating in the gift/subsistence economy.

Almost everyone on earth also participates, to greater or lesser extent, in the market economy. The key here is making the shift away from the the market economy and further into the gift/subsistence economy (until the market economy is ended altogether). Those in the global North who may be deeply trapped in the market economy can perhaps learn from the Indigenous peoples and others in the global South whose original gift/subsistence-based ways of living often survived colonization, at least to some extent.

I will keep singing to Mountain Mother and telling her that “we have come back to you,” because we must come back to her and many of us are trying to come back. The tension I feel from singing what is not yet fully true for me, not yet true for many others keeps me motivated in the work I do for Earth and all of us, her diversity of creatures (including the human ones). The challenge of creating a way of life that is good for us and good for the Earth is one that I choose. What could be more satisfying (and fun) for any of us than getting to know Mountain Mother really well and dumping capitalist colonizing patriarchy at the same time we transform our lives and our communities!

Mountain Mother, I hear you calling me.
Mountain Mother, we hear your cry.
Mountain Mother, we have come back to you.
Mountain Mother, we hear your sigh.

Notes

1. The lyrics given here are adapted by me from two different versions, one on page 128 of Carol Christ’s book The Serpentine Path and the other from the song sheet handed out on the fall 2022 Goddess Pilgrimage.

Women’s Revolution! Ending the Crisis of Patriarchal Civilization

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By Jeanne Neath

“My friends, do we realize for what purpose we are convened? Do we fully understand that we aim at nothing less than an entire subversion of the present order of society, a dissolution of the whole existing social compact.”
(Elizabeth Oakes Smith, September 8 1852, 3rd National Women’s Rights Convention)

Elizabeth Oakes Smith Millions of women have worked over centuries for the “subversion of the present order of society, a dissolution of the whole existing social compact.” We have wrought vast changes to women’s situation in many parts of the world. Yet now the decades long right wing driven backlash has been joined by runaway misogyny on the Internet and in the real world, as well as “transgender” males trying to take on and take over the identity of “woman.” Transactivists want to define real women out of existence and make it impossible for women to meet in public in groups that exclude males. With the misogynist support of many of the Left, transactivists are fighting to end the revolution of women. Women now face backlash from the right and Left!

How unsurprising that women and the movement for Women’s Liberation should be under such strong assault right at the moment in time when the fate of an entire civilization is twisting in the wind. You know the list of evils that have shaped the world we are living in – from patriarchy and capitalism, to racism and colonialism and on and on. The immediate repercussions for us are growing at exponential speed – from police assaults in Black communities, to the COVID-19 pandemic, to pipeline and other land grabs on indigenous and public lands, to anti-immigration atrocities, to the loss of jobs and homes in a nosediving economy, to climate chaos bringing us record-setting wildfires, floods, and more.

How unsurprising that women and the movement for Women’s Liberation should be under such strong assault right at the moment in time when the fate of an entire civilization is twisting in the wind.

Perhaps the men (mostly white) in power could have continued their exploitation of other humans indefinitely, but their exploitation of the Earth has irrevocable consequences. This civilization faces an ultimatum from the Earth and will either undergo a paradigm shift and end its practices of domination and exploitation or crumble under the pressures of climate chaos and other ecological failures.

Eco-Disaster! Scientists Call for Society’s Basic Structures to Change

Wickedary by Mary Daly After reading a recent report about the global state of the natural world, the word “necrophilia” began to haunt me. Defined by Mary Daly as the “hatred for and envy of Life,” Daly considered necrophilia to be the “most fundamental characteristic of patriarchy.” (Wickedary, p. 83 or online) The report, the “Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services: Summary for Policymakers,” was released in 2019 by IPBES, a U.N. international panel of 150 experts who, with the help of another 350 scientists, reviewed 15,000 publications on the state of nature. (IPBES stands for the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.)

A kind of scientific horror story, the report details the destruction of Life. We learn, for example, that globally, “natural ecosystems have declined by 47 per cent on average, relative to their earliest estimated states” and “the global biomass of wild mammals has fallen by 82 per cent.” (p. 25) If patriarchal hatred and envy of life is not at play, it is certainly difficult to understand how we have come to create this Sixth Extinction of life on earth.

Climate change is the ecological disaster we hear the most about, but IPBES found that the two “direct drivers of change in nature with the largest global impact” were humans 1) taking over land and sea (through agriculture, building infrastructure and expanding urban areas) and 2) direct exploitation of “animals, plants and other organisms, mainly via harvesting, logging, hunting and fishing.” (p. 12) The climate crisis was the third ranked destroyer of nature, though its impacts will inevitably increase. (See cropped Figure SPM 2 below, from the IPBES report.)

IPBES Figure SPM 2, partial

What surprised me most was that these 150 experts recognized that the only way out of this ecological crisis is “transformative” and “structural” change to the economy and society: “Goals for conserving and sustainably using nature and achieving sustainability cannot be met by current trajectories, and goals for 2030 and beyond may only be achieved through transformative changes across economic, social, political and technological factors.” (p. 14) The authors explain what they mean by “transformative”: “A fundamental, system-wide reorganization across technological, economic and social factors, including paradigms, goals and values.” (p. 14, IPBES report’s footnote 4) They continue: “Since current structures often inhibit sustainable development and actually represent the indirect drivers of biodiversity loss, such fundamental, structural change is called for.” (p. 16, italics above are mine)

What surprised me most was that these 150 experts recognized that the only way out of this ecological crisis is “transformative” and “structural” change to the economy and society.

You can be sure that the IPBES authors did not call for structural change without an overwhelming reason to do so. They made projections for the earth’s and humanity’s future by considering three scenarios. The earth fared better in the global sustainability scenario (proactive environmental policy, low consumption and low carbon emissions) than in the economic optimism (rapid growth, low environmental regulation) and regional competition scenarios. In all three scenarios almost all regions of the world did have an increase in nature’s “material contributions to people” (providing food, feed, timber, bioenergy).

But, all three scenarios, including even the “global sustainability” scenario, proved to be deadly for humans and the natural world. Both biodiversity and the ability of nature to provide “ecosystem services” essential to human societies spiraled downward. (See p. 38, IPBES report, Figure SPM 8 for comparisons of the three scenarios for different regions of the world.) Don’t let your eyes glaze over at mention of the term “ecosystem services.” Yes, this is a very human-centric way of looking at Earth’s activities, but these “services,” including crop pollination, crop pest control, natural carbon storage, and protecting the soil from erosion and loss of carbon and nitrogen, are critical to human survival.

Even the “global sustainability” scenario proved to be deadly for humans and the natural world. Both biodiversity and the ability of nature to provide “ecosystem services” essential to human societies spiraled downward.

The important point here is that IPBES is calling for a paradigm change as this is the only way to keep ecosystems functioning well enough to support human life and curtail the Sixth Extinction of life on earth.

Patriarchal Civilization in Crisis: The Paradigm Must Shift

Nafeez Ahmed, a perceptive male journalist, speaks bluntly about the IPBES report: “The report concludes that human civilization is systematically destroying its own life-support systems…” He continues: “The report is by far the most comprehensive to hit home how the collapse of biodiversity ultimately entails the collapse of human civilization.”

Ahmed points out that civilizational collapse is already underway: “Our democracies are in a state of collapse: incapable of addressing the systemic complexity of the crisis of civilization.” What is this systemic complexity? There are the climate and ecological crises we’ve been talking about. Then there is the question of how society can do away with the unending growth and exploitation that drives these crises when its worldviews, value systems, political and economic structures are deeply based in a paradigm of domination and profit-taking. The problems become impossibly complex as ecological and climate disruptions spawn social problems like wars and conflicts, large scale human migrations, and losses in communities wracked by wildfires and floods. As Ahmed explains, “our political leaders are preoccupied with the surface symptoms of this fundamental crisis of civilization rather then the crisis itself.”

“Our democracies are in a state of collapse: incapable of addressing the systemic complexity of the crisis of civilization.”

Ahmed argues that even the most forceful non-violent resistance cannot force fundamental changes on a system that is incapable of handling the extent and complexity of change required: “To break this paradigm requires far more than making demands of broken institutions.” He says that a paradigm shift must overturn the very basis of society, from the economic system to people’s deeply held values and beliefs to how we relate to others and live our everyday lives. Ahmed believes this paradigm shift can be brought on by individuals taking responsibility for changing ourselves, asking “how can I actually mobilize to build the new paradigm,” and taking “radical action in our own place-based contexts to build the seeds of the new paradigm, right here, right now.”

And Now…Sisterhood of Women and Earth

I don’t think the IPBES, Nafeez Ahmed, or the vast majority of radicals from the Left are looking for a women’s revolution when they call for paradigm change. It has become very clear with its pandering to the transgender movement that the Left is very willing to toss women and Lesbians under the bus. Any shift in paradigm that is not driven primarily by women would keep patriarchy in place and we know what that would mean for the Earth and for women.

As I see it, we must go further than what Ahmed suggests. Any new paradigm must move out of patriarchy and be based in Female and Earth centered societies. The tasks for women will depend on our what society or societies we are part of. We may be deeply embedded in the dominant society (globalized capitalist patriarchy) or belong, primarily or to a lesser extent, to Indigenous or other societies outside the dominant society.

Existing Matriarchal and Indigenous societies are already living in the new/old paradigm, yet women within them struggle against incursions by the dominant society and, in some societies, with a degree of male domination within. (Male domination within Indigenous societies is often the result of past and present colonization by invading patriarchal societies, but can also derive from “ancestral original patriarchy.”[1])

Women trapped within the dominant society can learn from Indigenous and Matriarchal societies and provide support for those cultures and the women in those cultures, as it is requested. Additional key tasks for women ensconced in the dominant society are to work to stop that society and all its oppressive practices and begin actively creating new Female and Earth centered systems and societies to replace the dominant global patriarchy.

Earth, the most powerful female force, is speaking clearly with every raging wildfire, hellish hurricane, or seething flood tearing at this man-made civilization. Nothing less than an equally fiery movement of women can turn the paradigm that is patriarchy into ashes.

The movement for Women’s Liberation lacks power now, thanks to decades of backlash and the divisions amongst us. The continued belief of many women in reform has always hobbled the movement, but now many reform-minded feminists are supporting transactivists and actively turning against radical feminists. The transactivists’ attempts to erase women and Lesbians and their campaign to label radical feminists as “TERFs” and cancel us are proving to be both an obstacle for Women’s Liberation as well as a consciousness raiser that draws more and more women to radical feminism.

In order to build up the international Women’s Liberation movement we must step up our organizing against queer and transgender ideologies and end the Left’s love affair with transactivism. We must stop the runaway misogyny. At the same time, our focus on a decolonizing ecofeminism, the power of our female bodies and spirits, the wisdom of women from every race and culture, and the creation of new – and defense of existing – Female and Earth centered subcultures, cultures, and societies serves as inspiration and refuge, as well as helping create the needed shift in paradigm. As women’s movement and power builds and ecological understandings come to the fore, support for transgender attempts to use excessive medical (Earth) resources and disregard biological realities will fade.

The Earth herself is now demanding “nothing less than an entire subversion of the present order of society,” the goal of women in 1852 and the goal of radical feminists today. Earth, the most powerful female force, is speaking clearly with every raging wildfire, hellish hurricane, or seething flood tearing at this man-made civilization. Nothing less than an equally fiery movement of women can turn the paradigm that is patriarchy into ashes. Yes, time is short as Earth’s temperature rises, but women are rising too. With the sisterhood of women and Earth teamed up against it, I don’t think capitalist patriarchy stands a chance. As Susan B. Anthony told us, “Failure is Impossible!”

*****

Footnotes

1. Here’s a quote from Betty Ruth Lozano Lerma: “Latin American feminisms question both Western patriarchy and the subordination of non-heterosexual women and persons within indigenous and Afro-descendant cultures. They affirm the existence of pre-Hispanic patriarchies, giving rise to concepts such as ‘ancestral original patriarchy’ and ‘low-intensity patriarchy,’ which show how women within the colonial context experienced an entanglement of patriarchies –entronque de patriarcados and, for the Afro-descendant case, ‘a black-colonial patriarchy’…” In “Latin American and Caribbean Feminisms” by Betty Ruth Lozano Lerma, an article in Pluriverse: A Post-Development Dictionary.