It would be great if some of your lady commenters could tell us more about Feminine Consciousness.

"... embracing the Feminine Consciousness in an effort for humanity to (sic) safe itself."

Actually, with the threats emerging in today's world, I think what humanity needs to "safe itself" is more good, old-fashioned MEN, 'like in the good old days' - confident men with balls who were not afraid to just do what needed to be done to protect their communities from danger, were held in esteem not shame for doing so, and weren't afraid to just be men, unlike the apologetic emasculated hollowed-out 'metros' that pass for men today. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned. Or maybe I'm just closer to the front lines, where you can see this a lot clearer.

Women in modern Western civilizations exist in what is really a tiny little clearing of "order against the chaos" carved out by the sacrifices of men throughout the ages, battling against the forces of nature and barbarians. To do the kinds of work required, men are better equipped and more willing. Feminists may claim to not need men - and in a certain limited sense this is true - but women today are alive thanks to what men only could've done in the past (and some continue to do); there but for the grace of men go women. It will thus (sorry to say) always remain a "man's world" because the very civilized world is a creation of men, which the rest merely get to enjoy. The apparent robustness of the peace and civility within which these feminists and their ideas can exist is an illusion; barbarism and chaos are knocking at the gates. Your real enemies are not abstract sociopolitical constructs.

I'm sure this will sound paranoid and alarmist if you haven't seen what's out there; but trust me, "feminine consciousness" (whatever that really means) will be no match. It may be useful elsewhere, but probably not for "safing" humanity.

Hmm, what is "purposeful travel", and how is it different to other types of travel? Wouldn't a business trip be "purposeful"?

It would be great if some of your lady commenters could tell us more about Feminine Consciousness.

Indeed. I love to hear about crazy hippie theories in the morning.

Enlightened people are really fun until they try to strike a conversation with you...

A monk asked Joshu "Does a hippie have the buddha nature?"

Joshu replied: "mu."

It would be great if some of your lady commenters could tell us more about Feminine Consciousness.

Can somebody help us out on this?

"Feminine Consciousness?" Is that a polite New Age term for PMS?

Funny.

I've dropped her an e-mail to ask her to help us all out on "Feminine Consciousness." I can't wait for the enlightenment to start.

It would be great if some of your lady commenters could tell us more about Feminine Consciousness.

Maybe it's that funny, crucial stuff ladies bring to child rearing, Crid?

You know, the ingredient gays can't contribute as parents?

Hahahahahahahaha.

Oh dear, thank you amy for a good giggle with the morning coffee.

I dont know if my rambling opinion will add anything or help with Crids Quest but that wont stop me from babbling a bit. I do need to stop giggling thgough, hang on. ok.

I think that many here may agree with my assumption that there are very big differences in the way men and women think. What the fuzzy bunnies dont seem to want to fully acknowledge is that the differences are biologically based and harwired. They wrap it in so much woo-hoo that someone needs to invent hipwaders for the mind. It doesnt mean one is worth less, just different and if it hadnt been something that produced value over the course of evolution and upped the probability of sending the genes downline through time it wouldnt have been so ground into us.

Small digression: Doesnt mean ways of thinking is rigidly linked to gender/sex, ther are many (myself included) who do not think totally female, or male. Cultural expectations, nurturing, and possible mismatches in brain/sex happen. Which would explain why i tend to understand and get along with men better than women.

I think the whole woo-woo fuzzy bunny crap is a lazy response to cover up the lack of effort and lack of ability to think rationally. Wrapped up in a total head to toe smug hostility that really makes me want to bitch slap. hard.

The best thing a person can do to develop in my little opinion is to learn to be a responsible adult and to think through as much as possible before acting and to step up and meet each challenge and responsibility as it pops up. Responsibilities to self, family, community etc.

I also think these fuzzy bunny smug condescending people are those with too much time on their hands.

I have alsways been too busy to cater to my inner stupidity, and always had too much self-respect to do much other than laugh when it did pop up.

Starting in 3 weeks i will be working 40 hrs week, and taking on 9-12 credit hours at community college. On that schedule of life improvement, who really gives a fuck about feminine concsiousness? I will be lucky enough to be conscious when it is time to slap the froot loops into the bowl for my son's breakfast.

oy, privileged people throwing away all the advantages they have going for them to float in the pretty clouds, screw them.

oops forgot one thing

I have a question that has been bothering me for a bit. All this exalting and enshrining of "sacred feminine" and getting in touch with feminine power blah blah bla.

Well I do have pagan friends, and they constantly nod their heads to the fact that there is male thought/energy/manifestation of deity and the female goddess crap too. Why is it that it is always the sacred feminine bullshit that is pushed. Where is the "sacred male" get in touch with your masculine ways bull puckey?

Just another set of hypocrites, and irrational ones to boot.

Because the only equipment needed to get in touch with your "masculine" side is a ball and a stick.

Getting in touch with the "sacred feminine" needs all kinds of supporting material. Beads, crystals, mats, incense, special clothes, drugs...

Speaking of balls and sticks, I've got 4 hours to get my weekend chores done before the game.

That Karen Tate "goddess" is on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiEP6MG97-Y

About thirty seconds into her "lecture" she says this:

In the beginning, God was a woman, and from her womb she created all that is. Thus, she is all things, and all things are her. Many believe she was the suns, the star and the moon.

Yeah, right. (I switched it off soon thereafter.)

Amy,

Wow, you really seem to be a magnet for these [Self Declared] Enlightened Feminists. First there was that one in Ontario, and now Ms. Tate.

You also hit it the nail on the head about an underlying hostility in so many such people. I've noticed this for years. And in the same basket I'd also add men who describe themselves as "humanists".

I'm convinced that all such folks have had some major strife in their lives, likely a combination of relationship rejection and being downright ostracized. To resolve their pain they find "God" but their God is more of a New Age version. In the process, they never actually resolve their initial problems but simply cover them up, finding countless reasons why everyone else to blame for their pain.

I should chat with a psychologist therapist friend of mine in Glendale and ask if this is a well documented mental illness.

The operative words in the beginning of that video: "I think not." Or, to be more precise, it should be "I reason not."

I love people who just make up shit and tell people to believe in it.

P.S. For anyone just joining us, I don't believe in any god, since I require evidence before believing in something.

You naysayers are soon to be overwhelmed by the Awesome Power of the Goddess and Feminine Consciousness!

Apparently, the Awesome Power of the Goddess and Feminine Consciousness has other plans.

It's Jody, the Jodester, the Jode-a-saures! It seems your mind has been opened in a way discomfiting to you, and you're going to be resentful about it for some time. But that's cool, we understand. As any teen can explain, shedding naiveté can be an unpleasant experience, as feelings of shame and vulnerability make these times of growth bittersweet. While the application of your new principles is a poor fit in this circumstance, it's important that you continue to test their suitability in contexts new and novel to you.

> Maybe it's that funny...

Maybe it is, but she should have said so (or you should have). Amy's correspondent doesn't deserve to be mocked for claiming there's a difference between men and women. She deserves to be mocked for pretending these matters can be made ethereal and comforting through the use of vague language. These distinctions are profoundly real, with us always, and often have terrifically painful consequences when we ignore them. Paglia has written huge books about this. There's not much in the natural world that's more interesting than the difference between men and women, especially when you try to describe it with clear meaning instead obfuscation.

Now, we've read the story of Darwin & Wallace many times. But a book review here (via A&LD) brings a new emphasis to the death of Darwin's daughter:

| ...Annie's death had a considerable
| impact on Darwin's thinking. 'In
| her last days, he had watched as
| her face was changed beyond
| recognition by the emaciation of
| her fatal illness. You could only
| understand the true conditions
| of life if you held on to a sense of
| the true ruthlessness of natural
| forces.' [...] Thus Darwin's eyes
| had been opened to the
| unforgiving processes that drive
| evolution.

Got that? All his erudition wasn't enough... His education, his wonderful perch in western society, and his travel through the riot of Galapagos biology only brought him to the edge. It wasn't until his little girl died pathetically in his arms, “without a sigh”, that he really understood how deeply unconcerned nature is with our fulfillment.

That piece made me even more grateful for my characteristic distrust of those who chirp that the natural world (including, as in the present case and so many others, femininity) is all about nourishing warmth and indecipherable compassion. Props to Amy for targeting the “spirituality” and “sacredness.”

> the ingredient gays can't
> contribute as parents?

The “ingredient” is difference. 'Cause remember, what I think is best for kids is a loving mother with a loving father.

Karen Tate writes back:

http://www.karentate.com/Tate/Embracing%20the%20Feminine%20Consciousness%20-%20A%20Revolution%20of%20Thought.pdf

I get where you're coming from Amy. Ann Coulter is probably your hero. But if you or your readers want a quick over-view of the importance of the Feminine Consciousness they can click on my article above. In the briefest sense, it's about women supporting women and not denigrating themselves or others. It's about finding peace, harmony, balance, partnership, equality, inclusiveness and seeking Divine wisdom. It's about restoring the sacred, our reverence for Mother Earth. It's about the needs of the many and not the few. Can you really find something wrong with that?

Thanks for the chance to reach your readers and you.

Karen

I told her: "I posted your response. You're kinda nasty for a woo-woo broad."

She writes back again (apparently allergic to blog commenting):

In a message dated 6/28/08 12:04:34 PM, karentate108@ca.rr.com writes:

Amy,
I wasn't trying to be nasty.  I was trying to get your attention and give you an alternative perspective how your usage of the word Goddess can be detrimental.  Its no different than if a male advice columnist called himself a god.  The idea of Goddess isn't taken seriously and that's damaging to women's psyches and a distortion of many cultures' spiritual values over thousands of years.  I sincerely think we women have to support each other and our gender out in the world.  So please accept my apology if I offended you.

As for purposeful travel.... if you were really asking sincerely what it is, it's the art of pilgrimage or doing something meaningful that nourishes one's soul during vacation time away from work, as people have done for thousands of years.  It's doctors who take their vacations and work for Doctors Without Borders, or Jews, Christians and Muslims that go to Jerusalem, or people who travel to seek out their cultural, spiritual or ancestral roots.  Sometimes they're on a quest to curry favor with their deity.  It's not just travel with any purpose.

karen

My response: "I'll post this on my blog, too. Karen, really, you ought to try having a sense of humor. Life goes over much easier that way."

There's that word again, "nourish".

Some of the fattest people in human history think they're starving

Crid - it's the incredible guilt they feel at being in such comparative historical luxury.

For these people, it's not merely enough to acknowledge that we stand upon the shoulders of giants. They feel that they must apologize to all those who were unable or unwilling to join us for the climb.

The idea that taking some idea of some deity seriously is going to help corporeal beings is ludicrous. That Muslims feel they must go on a raging binge of slaughter and destruction at every perceived slight to their precious allah points out a flaw in them, not in others for failing to show proper reverence.

Karen needs to get her cranium out of her hind end and stop looking for deeper meaning. Because I can tell you that there ain't none. God is neither kind and benevolent nor vile and sadistic. God simply doesn't give a flying fuck about the Universe or anything in it.

In other words, Karen, you're on your own. You make your own esteem. And if seeing the word Goddess in a context you don't like traumatizes you, I suggest you go somewhere far from civilization where you won't be our problem any longer.

I'll bet Karen has about 30 cats.

Amy said: Funny.

I've dropped her an e-mail to ask her to help us all out on "Feminine Consciousness." I can't wait for the enlightenment to start. (Amy off)

It is called solidarity, bitch. :)

Fucking chicks.

"In the briefest sense, it's about people supporting people and not denigrating themselves or others. It's about finding peace, harmony, balance, partnership, equality, inclusiveness and seeking some kinda' wisdom. It's about restoring the sacred, our reverence for this place called Earth. It's about the needs of the many and not the few."

huh, you can remove all shreds of gender and supernatural from that and it still works. it's almost as if there needs to exist some kind of entity beyond themselves, to convince them to do what they feel is right...

instead of just doing it.

One thing about inclusiveness:

Its all well and good, but don't pretend for even a moment that if you clutch a snake to your breast, no matter how many times you spout "I accept you" the snake remains a snake, it will bite and poison and kill those who would coddle or cuddle it.

If you have a sense of purpose, then you feel purpose washing your underwear or scrubbing the toilet. If you want to be deep or be shallow, then you put that specific intention behind your action.

Just because you've travelled to India to stare at impoverished children under some organization doesn't mean that you aren't thinking about when you'll be taking your bubble bath with the new fancy bottle of lavender hooha wash. If you are hostile, that is the message that's coming out of you.

Pointing fingers at people for what they "should" be doing, and what you consider to be "purposeful travel" and proper use of names (like Goddess) smacks of heavy insecurity. Why else the need to tell other people what to do. And if we are going for deeper peace, why the concern for women over men? The basic attitude underlying that is lack.

And that, I would guess, in addition to Amy's well-known view on "new age and feminist ideals" would have as much to do with her rebuttal as the subject matter. Further, if Ms. Tate is truly interested in feminine equality and fulfillment, why would she want to take away the use of a name (Goddess)--except if it suits her ideas--unless she was slapping value judgments and lack of on another woman.

Doesn't sound too "feminist" to me. But what do I know. I'm more interested in "travelling" to the toilet in a timely matter. All the important things in life, you know...

People like Karen make me want to run screaming from the room and get a concealed carry permit. Can't she just admit that she screwed up by sending you the SPAM email and let it go?

She'll be in OC on Sunday. I've already got plans, but someone should go.

Sunday, June 29, 2008
Guest Minister at Goddess Temple of Orange County

Agree about the latent hostility - how they come over all tetchy when you won't fall in with their new age crap - another cult. I recently had to sit through a womanist environmentalist sermon by one of Al Gore's "accredited" climate change presenters, now living here in Australia. A 50-year-old introducing herself as "a woman, a mother..." (How about at least a thinker?) She stated at the beginning there wasn't going to be any science... and there certainly wasn't any reason. It was an insult to anyone's intelligence.

One of my favorite "Feminine Consciousness" lies is the silly allegation that there was a Matriarchal Golden Age, full of peace and justice and hemp-based sharing, before the evil horse-riding patriarchs invaded.

Another hilarious idea floating around the "Feminine Consciousness" community is idea that women have authority on various matters of fact and morality because women have a special psychic connection to the earth, a sort of feminist version of the Nazi blood-and-soil ideology. Needless to say, these goddess-worshipping progressives are even more humorless than the norm.

What bullshit. Peasants and migrant workers have more of a connection to the earth because they have the miserable job of tilling it by hand and/or picking food out of it.

pst314:

As the saying goes: "Scratch a feminist, find a fascist."

this was an excellent read for a sunday morning. thanks!

that said, it's good to see someone who shuts down the bullshit that is spread around these days. This post reminded me of a bit the late George Carlin did...

> full of peace and justice
> and hemp-based sharing,

Much is explained

For most of us, things have probably never been worse in our
lifetime than they are now. -- "Embracing the Feminine Consciousness: A Revolution of Thought" by Karen Tate. First printed online in The New Age Journal. URL above.

I struggled through the first page until I reached the above, then I stopped reading.

Dang! I was at our High School All Class Reunion yesterday and missed all this! Or did I?

I like SwissArmyD's take on it: remove the gender and supernatural hooha from it, and it becomes what it should be, a true statement about how we all should be living life. Funny, that. o_O

PS - Had a blast yesterday, seeing bunches of people I went to high school with, partying like there was tomorrow (which of course, there is), renewing old friendships and the like.

Yup. Gotta love self-claimed credentials like spiritual knowledge, which is unmoored from both competition among people and verfiable numbers observed in experiment. You simply announce your knowledge (and therefore authority...). Spirituality is easy to claim, easy to flourish for social gain, and hard for others to disprove. You would almost think there is a scam involved...

Along those same lines, I love how this gal couples making some bucks with her mystical nonsense. Really brings to mind that George Carlin clip the other day.

One of the more annoying traits of this third rate religious huckster, however, is how she so quickly alternates between superciliousness and a feigned humility. I think the latter is just her frock to demonstrate her higher order consciousness; she really thinks highly of herself, and people who do not agree are sniped at pretty quickly.

People like her couldn't do the math to brew up even the weak tea of stats-based liberal arts, let alone the heavy lifting of gathering real knowledge. But rather than just cop to her mediocrity, she goes all Goddess on everyone, likely thinking that spiritual credentials will make her brain bigger.

Her biggest mistake is not going into academia. They actually give jobs for life to people spouting dumber shit than that.

Perhaps Miss Tate missed the whole Yin-Yang, Male-Female, Myers-Briggs thang.

She could start here:

http://mkfreeberg.webloggin.com/yin-and-yang-x/

I'm going to preface this by saying that I'm a fairly militant "Athiagnostigan," which is a religion I made up. But the "-gan" is "Pagan," a subject on which I've done a fair amount of reading. And I've read some doozies, let me tell you.

So I'm going to break it down here for all you unenlightened simpletons:

"Feminine Consciousness," as explained by the most enlightened "Goddess-Worshipers" is the female equivalent of hardcore patriarchal monotheism, only in reverse. It glorifies women to the exclusion of men. It promotes women's traits under the assumption that they would create a perfect, wonderful, beautiful utopia and men in all their callous, unbending, violent, single-minded glory have fucked it all up. Therefore we need to promote women's traits and bury our male ones. Only then do we become perfect people. Who are beyond reproach, by the way. Hey, why are you laughing?

In part I think the "Goddess Spirituality" mentality is a response to "The Big Three" monotheistic religions assigning "good" and "bad" classifications where there are none inherently (ie. Man= good, Woman= backstabbing, forbidden fruit-eating, serpent worshipper.)

I partially subscribe to a kinder, gentler (made-up) philosophy; there is indeed "male" energy and "female" energy in that men and women are fundamentally different. There is nothing bad or good about either. I don't believe that men fucked up society any more than I believe in matriarchal "utopias."

PS- I'm writing a book about "Athiagnistigan-ism" and how it will change your life, solve your problems, and make you perfect. Would you give me some free press, Amy? The book only costs $40. Unless you go to one of my seminars, too...

Hilarious. Thanks for explaining that, Homeless in Seattle.

People should also feel to give me $40 or $400 or $4000. I can't promise you that it'll get you to heaven. And wouldn't, since there's no evidence such a place exists. But, I promise I'll enjoy myself on every dime of it. How's that?

I find the "spiritual" such bigoted assholes. Once you don't share their "spiritual" awakenings, they discount you totally and won't listen to you until you agree with what they say. At least a religionist will argue with you. They shut down as if you aren't even worth hearing. Assholes.

That said, I see some hypocricy here. I see an out and out scam to make money and I think that's where her anger truly comes from. You shut her down instead of promoting her book (she obviously assumed someone going by goddess would be dumb enough) and helping her scam other women out of their money. To paraphrase the O'Jays (yes, men, they said it well): Don't call me sister...

Thanks for the link, Ranier. Any other Young & Restless fans notice the resemblence to Nikki Newman? Well, in that old pic before she went to the video anyway. Nikki never ballooned out like that. But it kind of says it all. She's grown fat off this scam.

Oh Amy - She's not hostile. It's painful for her to be SO right, when you're so wrong!!! She's just in so much edgy-making pain . . . for you.
;)

> She's grown fat off this scam.

Nicely put.