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Violating Women’s Rights under the Disguise of Religion
Women have fought hard and long for rights that men take for granted. Our own Constitution declares that all men (men in the generic form) are created equal. But most men, thankfully not all men, have chosen to believe that somehow God created females as inferior beings and therefore the phrase: all men are created equal does not apply. But, where in any of the so-called holy books, supposedly written by God, does it spell out that women were designed inferior? We live longer, we endure pain better, and we use both sides of our brain, not just the left side. We recover from strokes with less damage and we sustain childbirth after childbirth after childbirth. So, where are we inferior? Some of us are shorter, true, and some of us are not as strong, true. But we do not need to be tall or stronger or whatever other trait men deem as strictly male and therefore more valuable, to balance a check book, or write computer software or hold political office, or do research for the next big medical breakthrough. I was once told by a male, that proof of our inferiority is the fact that we can’t pee standing up. As if the act of peeing is somehow more valuable then the act of bringing a new life into the world. Besides, some women can pee standing up without getting their socks wet. Oprah happens to be one of them.
Male pharmacists are refusing to fill women’s birth control prescriptions saying it offends their moral beliefs. And to them, I say, our forefathers deemed a separation of church and state. So, by imposing their beliefs on these women, they are violating the separation of church and state. A woman, under the constitution of all men are created equal, has a right to control her own personal health and body. But many men and sadly, even some women, declare that their religious beliefs are more valuable than any woman’s rights. What they do not understand is that their rights end where the woman’s rights begin.
Even the simple act of denying sex education to teens is a violation of the separation of church and state. It is preventing all teens, regardless of their own religious beliefs or non beliefs from having the information they need to make wise choices and to protect their health. These teens are being forced to abide by someone else’s religious dogma. That is not freedom of religion or separation of church and state. Our nation gives aid to 3rd world countries, but it has strings attached. If any government agency of the nation receiving that aid, talks to women about birth control, or family planning in any form, the aid is reduced or stopped altogether.
In some areas of the world, women are forced to cover themselves from head to toe in garments that are hot and that hinder free movement. They are denied the right to an education. They are forbidden to leave their homes without male supervision. Women are even stoned to death for disobeying men’s rules. Except the males claim it is God’s rules the women are violating and therefore deserve to die. And who are they to say that they know what God wants? No one has a cell phone that rings up in heaven and gets continuous up-dates on what God wants or doesn’t want. If we believe that God has given us laws to live by, then one of those laws are: Thou Shalt Not Kill! So, how does that get mixed up to read …..except women or gays or blacks or browns or greens with pink polka dots? None of that is God’s law. All of that is men’s law, made up by those in power who prefer to remain in power. God’s wrath , heaven, hell are all threats that are used as tools of intimidation to justify their dominance over and their hatred towards women. Some of the men who often feel the most hatred for women are the ones who they themselves feel inferior. A woman gets raped, and members of her own family will say they have been shamed. They blame the victim and declare that she deserves to die to restore the family’s honor. As if, she, some how, was the cause of the rape. The men do not want to admit or deal with the fact that one of their own, or many of their own are out of control and need to be stopped. And so, the woman is killed. And everyone believes honor has been restored, while the rapist is alive and free to rape again.
Even here in the United States, where we want to believe we are the most civilized, we have women dying at the hands of their partners, little girls being stolen and sold into the sex trade business every day. And we say as a nation, that is intolerable, but the truth is, our society allows the torture of females. After all, we are only females.