Thoughts

Thursday, October 11, 2012

One in Four... and reincarnation of the collective consciousness

So in my last post, I made the following assertions:

"One out of every four women in the United States has been raped, or beaten by an intimate partner. New York Times, Dec 14, 2011"

ONE IN FOUR WOMEN. To put another way, within a four generation cycle of women - 5yo daughter, 30yo mother, 60yo grandmother, 85yo great-grandmother - in EVERY family, one of those women has been sexually assaulted.

From another perspective: one out of every four men is a rapist or has beaten his intimate partner. ONE IN FOUR MEN. In your own family, sons, father, grandfathers, great-grandfathers... one of those men have committed a rape.

And more than a few people came back with the main question: 1 in 4 rapists? Do you really mean to assert a 1:1 ratio of rapists to rape victims? Surely a rapist rapes multiple women and the actual occurrence of rapists in the general population is much lower...

Here is another blog post about a women's intellectual relationship with the possibility of rape:

While you may assume that none of the men you know are rapists, I can assure you that at least one is. Consider: if every rapist commits an average of ten rapes (a horrifying number, isn’t it?) then the concentration of rapists in the population is still a little over one in sixty. That means four in my graduating class in high school. One among my coworkers. One in the subway car at rush hour. Eleven who work out at my gym. How do I know that you, the nice guy who wants nothing more than companionship and True Love, are not this rapist? I don’t.

from: SCHRÖDINGER’S RAPIST: OR A GUY’S GUIDE TO APPROACHING STRANGE WOMEN WITHOUT BEING MACED

First of all, let me say that her blog post is amazing, and you should read all of it. It offers a very insightful window into the experience of women interacting with unknown men. That said, she is making a different point than I am, and her statistical logic is fuzzy and unscientific (as much as it seems like a reasonable estimate). Not that my statistical logic is better than hers, but I did look up a few more numbers - and I'm gonna look up some more other numbers to back up my unscientific assertions...

Unfortunately, there aren't any real statistics out there assessing the number rapists in the general population (not that I've been able to find). Shockingly, almost all of the research seems to be focused on the victims... and how the victims can avoid putting themselves in a "risky situation..." as apposed to researching the people committing the crime and how those individuals could avoid becoming rapists in the first place... And that is a point that Miss Lonely Hearts and I are in complete agreement on.

Ok, so: to start out with, some definition and defining. The 1:4 number for women includes both completed rape and violent assault. Being beaten by an intimate partner encompasses much of basic domestic violence - which is often a situational crime of passion, as opposed to a predatory act. Specifically, this definition of rape includes force or coercion of any kind between married couples.

From the current Wikipedia article on "Rape":

In 2012, the FBI changed their definition from "The carnal knowledge of a female forcibly and against her will." to "The penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim." for their annual Uniform Crime Reports. The definition, which had remained unchanged since 1927, was considered outdated and narrow...
Some countries, such as Germany, are now using more inclusive definitions which do not require penetration,[17] and the 1998 International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda defines it as "a physical invasion of a sexual nature committed on a person under circumstances which are coercive".[17] In some jurisdictions, the term "rape" has been phased out of legal use in favor of terms such as "sexual assault" or "criminal sexual conduct".[22] Other countries or jurisdictions continue to define rape to cover only acts involving penile penetration of the vagina, treating all other types of non-consensual sexual activity as sexual assault. Scotland, for instance, requires that a rapist commit a sexual assault with a penis, so only males can legally be rapists.

Frankly, I lean more towards the Rwanda definition. I understand that it seems important to some people to distinguish between assaults that involve genital penetration and those that do not, as a way of gauging the severity of the violation... but to me, it simply matters that the person's body has been violated in a sexual way. That someone has said to them, "my sexual desires are more important than your personal autonomy." That their wishes, their individuality, their sovereignty to decide for themselves how they will relate to the world and to other people... are less important than those of a person of greater power. That the person of power is entitled to take what they want... that it is their privilege. They deserve it. Conversely, that they cannot control themselves... that they are passionate, carnal people, and at a certain point of arousal, there's just no going back, and they could not stop...

And how did the men of our society come to be trained in such entitlement?

Genesis 3:16 Unto the woman [God] said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee. (book of Genesis seems to have been written between 1400-800 bce)

Though the bible repeatedly announced that a woman who dared to make love to a man other than her husband was a shameful and profane degredation to the entire faith, Hebrew men went about honorably collecting as man women as they could economically afford. ... A lack of fidelity on the part of the man seems to have been taken for granted, unless the other woman was already married or betrothed. This was regarded as sinful because it was a legal infringement upon the property of some other man. It was hardly a romantic fidelity for both partners of the marrieage that was deemed as important or sacred, but only for the woman that premarital virginity and sexual fidelity became "moral" issues, attitudes we see reflected even today. (pg 191 Shekina Mountainwater, "When God Was a Woman" 1976)

For nearly two thousand years, we have been living in a patriarchal society, with every facet of that patriarchy being reinforced and programmed into us by religious myth and law.
(Analysis of what the world was like prior to the rise of patriarchy and monotheism is for another blog post... suffice it to say that I completely reject the idea that male domination is "the way it's always been", and that that's how we evolved. Current archaeological evidence and interpretation point more and more to dominant female deities, and matriarchal control from the dawn of human consciousness, 60,000 year ago, up until the the rise and takeover of monotheism and patriarchy, roughly 2,000 years ago.)

So, whether or not we think that we are religious... whether or not we even believe in god or believe that religion is a bunch of bullshit... we each carry the social programming of two thousand years of society ruled by religious priests and ideas. Social programming. And at the very core of many of those religions, is the assertion that God is male and men are supreme, and women are to be subservient to men.

And in reference to that legacy, feminism and gender liberation have made incredible strides in the past 100 years. That's about two or three generations. Maybe four.

And right now, today, 1 in four women has been raped or sexually assaulted.

Because men still feel that entitlement. Because our society is still patriarchal, and men hold a power and privilege over women that is reinforced by two thousand years of cultural heritage.

The only statistics I could find about rapists is a series of information that seems to be based on surveys of college students done in the 1980's and 90's.

Between 62% (4) and 84% (1) of survivors knew their attacker.
8% of men admit committing acts that meet the legal definition of rape or attempted rape. Of these men who committed rape, 84% said that what they did was definitely not rape. (1)
More than one in five men report "becoming so sexually aroused that they could not stop themselves from having sex, even though the woman did not consent." (8)
35% of men report at least some degree of likelihood of raping if they could be assured they wouldn't be caught or punished. (9)

http://www.oneinfourusa.org/statistics.php

So... to come back to my assertion that 1 in 4 men have committed a rape, or an act of sexual assault... I would say that yes: 1 in 4 men is capable of getting a woman drunk and then having non-consensual sex with her. Capable of coercing and pressuring a younger woman to sleep with him. Capable of getting drunk and smacking his wife/girlfriend around and then forcibly fucking her in their bed in the middle of the night. Capable of intentionally copping a feel on some hot chick as she unguardedly slides by him in a public place. Capable of taking advantage of privilege and certain knowledge that there are no consequences for those actions. Capable of doing all of these things without once thinking that he is committing an act of rape.

And perhaps, by my definition, the number for women experiencing sexual assault is more like 1 in 3, or 1 in 2, or damn near every one of us.

Because the point that I'm getting at, again, is that each and every one of us on the planet carries the cultural heritage of both the victim and perpetrator. In my own family, both my grandmother and my grandfather.

In the Buddhist and Hindu religions, reincarnation is believed to be a journey on the way to enlightenment. And on that journey, the one soul lives many different lives, sometimes as a criminal, sometimes as a victim, sometimes wealthy and comfortable, living each life with a specific lesson to be learned. But if we take each of those souls, on each of their individual journeys, and we weave them into the tapestry of collective consciousness, collective knowing... then maybe there is a unified journey, across the planet, towards a shift... towards a world community of balanced energy. Balanced between male and female, balanced between spiritual and physical, balanced human interaction with our environment and fellow creatures on the earth...

A more scientific explanation, as we connect more and more with population and technology, the computing power of our collective consciousness grows greater and greater. The computer of human thought and connection gains more neurons every day. And as our knowledge grows, our understanding of our place in the world and how to preserve ourselves, how to live truly free lives...

Anyways. What we have right now is a world-wide culture of patriarchy and male privilege. It is starting to shift, slowly, but it would shift a lot faster if men would start jumping ship... if we realize that the spark of consciousness needed to make the shift is in each and every one of us, and it begins with healing the wounds inside ourselves. It begins with people in positions of privilege to begin to recognize their privilege and take responsibility for shifting the power balance.

It also begins with empowering people in oppressed positions... women, people of color, indigenous groups, those in poverty... empower those people to stand up for themselves and assert their rights, and to hold those in power accountable.

And love and compassion. That just makes everything work better.

Saturday, September 22, 2012

Follow-up thoughts on Cultural Appropriation...

So, back in April, I wrote this post about Cultural Appropriation. And it was a new set of thoughts for me. They were ideas that I had not spent time mulling over before that moment. And at the time, I concluded that it was a grey area and I went ahead with the project... And at the time, that was a huge cop-out.

But I've been mulling it over all summer. And in the meantime, I've been studying feminism, reading books about women's spirituality, and reading about religious archaeology. And along the way, I've been noticing strong correlations between my own growing feminist sensitivity, and the expressed sensitivity of those who did think that a white lady making dreamcatcher artwork was tasteless and offensive.

And here's my #1 thought that is leading my growing sensitivity:

A person in a position of privilege does not get to define the parameters of what makes people in a position of oppression feel oppressed. Period.

To make the point as blunt as possible:

A person suffers PTSD from having been repeatedly violently and sexually abused. The person is shamed as a result of this abuse and told to keep it a secret. Told not to talk about it, because people will call you "bad" for making them feel uncomfortable... As a result of this abuse and shaming, the wound festers over time and gnaws at that person's ability to fully and freely be their happiest, most powerful selves.

And this person is going along their daily life, the one in which they mostly pretend that everything is fine, and someone who fits the basic socioeconomic, racial, and gender category as their rapist, makes a rape joke. Maybe it's only something as simple as, "Oh man, that bitch was asking for it".... it's a joke... it's not serious... The person making this offhand comment is Not A Rapist. And our dear PTSD sufferer is triggered with shadows of violation. They try to respond to say, "when you say things like that, it really upsets me, and I would like you to choose different words to express yourself with."

And how often do you think that Not A Rapist replies with a respectful, "oh, I didn't realized my words... I will be more conscious and respectful of that in the future..." How often do you think that happens? VERY FUCKING SELDOM. A much more likely response is, "Oh, you just need to be less sensitive. I didn't mean anything by it. It was just a joke. What are you, the Thought Police?"

Having experienced both of these responses from men and sometimes women at various times in my own life, in various situations, I can say that even in a progressive, "liberal" community, even in a community of activists fighting against oppression, the "fuck off, bitch" response is WAY MORE COMMON. Plenty of times I have been the one expressing offensive jokes. And as often as not, when called on it, my own responses were dismissive of other people's lived experience... I think that I have gotten better at accepting and respecting the experiences of others, even when it means that I need to check myself...

So, to come back from the blunt, and move towards the more subtle; to view the whole system in a unified way...

Why is the sensitivity of that one victim so important...? Why do we have to tiptoe around those few injured people...? Because it is not just a few injured people. It is ALL OF US. Every single human on the whole planet... What??? Surely I am expressing an obnoxious hyperbole, you might say... but let's look at some numbers:

One out of every four women in the United States has been raped, or beaten by an intimate partner. New York Times, Dec 14, 2011

ONE IN FOUR WOMEN. To put another way, within a four generation cycle of women - 5yo daughter, 30yo mother, 60yo grandmother, 85yo great-grandmother - in EVERY family, one of those women has been sexually assaulted.

From another perspective: one out of every four men is a rapist or has beaten his intimate partner. ONE IN FOUR MEN. In your own family, sons, father, grandfathers, great-grandfathers... one of those men have committed a rape.

[I have had several people question me about the statistical accuracy of this assertion. Rather than come up with a quick correction or defense, I feel the content of a follow-up blog post brewing in me... to be posted in the next few days.]

The statistics for the rest of the world are not better (And prevalence of rape does not appear to correlate strongly to whether or not a country is "developed" wikipedia article of rape statistics).

So worldwide, we have this gaping wound of trauma... trauma of violating the sanctity and sovereignty of another person's body. A trauma of acting without consent and a trauma of victimizing and torturing ourselves. We see it reflected in our relationship with the land... our relationship with our brother and sister creatures of different species. A trauma of universal self-destruction and self-punishment. And the first step in healing is to begin naming and acknowledging the wounds.

In my own family, my maternal grandmother was abused as a child. She never spoke about it in much detail but she spoke of physical violence. As a child at the turn of the century in Richmond, VA, it is a fair assumption there was sexual abuse. Later, in her marriage to my grandfather, there was again physical and sexual violence, leading her to eventually run away in the night to the home of friends, as her only safe option for leaving my grandfather. And how could I expect that this violence and abuse did not affect my grandmother's children; my mother and my aunt and my uncle. Even if they were never the direct victims of his anger and abuse, to grow up in a home where their mother is in fear of their father... would have a deep affect on anyone's identity and psyche. This story was spoken of very little in my own memory. It is only in this past year, on a journey of healing and seeking, that I have begun dredging up these memories, talking with my sister about them, and thinking about how the legacy of that trauma has impacted my own life. And it has impacted my life very deeply...

So rape jokes are not funny because we all, every one of us, carry the victim/perpetrator legacy of rape. The jokes are not funny because they trivialize and minimalize the wound instead of letting it heal...

So back to the dreamcatchers I made... those are different, right? My thoughtful artwork that happens to appropriate the styles and motifs of a native tradition are not equivalent to a rape joke, are they? Except that they kinda are.

Because Mt Rushmore is roughly equivalent to the Nazis having carved a giant portrait of Hitler into a cliffside of Mt Sinai (sacred mountain of judaism...). Ok now, before you get revved-up to accuse me of hyperbole again (because yes, I am sometimes prone to it...): in this statement I am 100% earnest and serious.

The "final solution" of the North American Indian problem was the model for the subsequent Jewish holocaust and South African apartheid

Why is the biggest holocaust in all humanity being hidden from history? Is it because it lasted so long that it has become a habit? It's been well documented that the killing of Indigenous people in the Western Hemisphere since the beginning of colonization has been estimated at 120 million. Yet nobody wants to speak about it.

Today historians, anthropologists and archaeologists are revealing that information on this holocaust is being deliberately eliminated from the knowledge base and consciousness of North Americans and the world. A completely false picture is being painted of our people as suffering from social ills of our own making. By Kahentinetha Horn, MNN Mohawk Nation News Jan. 30, 2005

“Hitler’s concept of concentration camps as well as the practicality of genocide owed much, so he claimed, to his studies of English and United States history. He admired the camps for Boer prisoners in South Africa and for the Indians in the wild west; and often praised to his inner circle the efficiency of America’s extermination – by starvation and uneven combat – of the red savages who could not be tamed by captivity.” – P. 202, “Adolph Hitler” by John Toland

And the death tole of our holocaust is 100 million people. To put that in perspective compared to the WWII Holocaust:

That is the destruction of an entire continent of hundreds of thriving civilizations. "Of course, as the scoffers point out, regardless of the true number of indigenous inhabitants in North America at the point of contact with Europeans, the great bulk of them died, not as the result of direct military action, or at the hands of some Euroamerican equivalent of the nazi's killing squads, but as the reult of famine and disease. This is said as if such a type of death were a purely natural phenomenon, a matter absolving the invader of responsibility for such an outcome. Far from naturally, however, the mass starvation at issue was largely induced through he deliberate dislocation of indigenous nations from their traditional homelands, the impounding of their resources, and the destruction of their economies through military or paramilitary action. (The State of North America, Introduction: The Holocaust in North America by M. Annette, Jaimes)

So... here we are with this gaping open wound in our Great American Collective Unconscious... No one talks about it, because it is uncomfortable... no one feels responsible for it, personally, because that happened hundreds of years ago... Actually it happened between the last 1-500 years, is still happening today. If you need proof of the ongoing reality of this oppression and trauma to native peoples, just read the latest issue of National Geographic: "In the Shadow of Wounded Knee" August 2012.

And again, how can I personally take responsibility for this history? What resources do I have at hand to begin healing this wound within myself, the wound that is within all of us? For starters, I can resist the sexist oppression that works to silence my voice, works to convince me that my body and my image do not belong to me. I can stand up as a strong and self-realized feminist. And from my position of white, middle-class privilege, I can begin to be a conscious and proactive ally for cultural minorities, victims of genocide... through my artwork and my speech, through my lifestyle decisions and how I choose to spend my money. I can choose to respect the art forms of those traditions and leave them to the people they belong to. Not to keep them stagnant, in a museum case, but to re-interpret and evolve those symbols in reference to their own cultures and their own lives.

And to be more specific about why it is offensive for a white person to make and sell something that is obviously a dreamcatcher, in any medium:

"They came for our land, for what grew or could be grown on it, for the resources in it, and for our clean air and pure water. They stole these things from us, and in taking the also stole our free ways and the best of our leaders, killed in battle or assassinated. And now, after all that, they've come for the very last of our possessions; now they want our pride, our history, our spiritual traditions. They want to rewrite and remake these things, to claim them for themselves. The lies and thefts just never end." Margo Thunderbird, 1988 from The State of Native America pg 403

"The term 'whiteshaman'... belongs to the apparently growing number of small-press poets of generall white, Euro-Christian American background, who in their poems assume the persona of the shaman, usually in the guise of an American Indian medicine man. To be a poet is simply not enough; they must claim a power from higher sources." pg 403

"Whiteshamans and their defenders, assuming a rather amazing gullibility on the part of American Indians, usually contend they are 'totally apolitical.' ... They often add the insulting caveat that American Indian writers know less of their ancestral traditions and culture than non-native anthropologists. Finally, most argue that 'artistic license' or 'freedom of speech' inherently empowers them to do what they do, no matter whether Indians like it (and, ultimately, no matter the cost to native societies). Native American scholars, writers, and activists have heard these polemics over and over again. It is time to separate fact from fantasy in this regard." pg 405
"The Great Pretenders: Further Reflections on Whiteshamanism" by Wendy Rose from The State of Native North America

So in conclusion... there are about thirty of my bicycle Dream Catchers floating around the world now, five for six of which are hanging in public, in bike shops around Seattle. I didn't end up making any monetary profit off of the project - possibly due to my own growing discomfort with the offense of the composition. But what do I do with them? Shall I run around Seattle collecting them all and destroying them? Shall I take all of the images of them off of the internet? That feels scary... like killing a part of my own fragile, budding artistic expression. But maybe it would be a ceremonial killing of that part of myself that was unknowingly complicit in cultural genocide... I have not decided. I do know that moving forward, if I choose to continue doing weaving work in circular compositions, I will try very hard to make them look distinctly different from dreamcatchers. And I am now very conscious of my responsibility as an artist to resist the temptation to engage in whiteshamanism. When one starts to become sensitive to such a thing, you begin to realize how sickening prevalent it is...

Moving forward, I am working on naming the cultural and psychic wounds that I carry in myself, as victim and perpetrator of oppression and genocide. Moving forward I can begin to create my own proactive strategies for healing these wounds in my life and my communities.