Pretzels: The cruelty behind patriarchal women in positions of power by Sara Wright

” I would say it’s not just patriarchal men in power. The patriarchal women in power are doing plenty of damage as well. The cruel choices are deliberate and to see the pretzels they turn themselves into to justify the cruelty is a sight to behold.”
Janet Rudolph

During the last year I have been repeatedly betrayed by women. In retrospect my mother initiated me into woman betrayal by terrorizing a sensitive little girl by threatening to send her away if she wasn’t ‘good’. My terror of all women and my mother’s skepticism/dismissal of my grandmother as an ‘old woman’ whose opinions didn’t matter eroded my relationship with my grandmother that followed me into adulthood with catastrophic effects.

 My fear kept me separate from the comfort of developing friendships with any woman until I became a feminist (yet I felt like an orphan when my grandmother died so my love for her survived).

 I came to feminism through the back door through my love for Nature, the only real mother I have ever known. My love for animals, plants, trees, did their best to sustain me although I was very lonely. It is important to acknowledge that I also chose to be alone because I seemed to have so little in common with women in general (my 50 percent). 

When I discovered feminism at mid-life, I believed that I was being given a second chance with women. I accepted the mantle of eco -feminism with great enthusiasm beginning with Susan Griffin, Mary Daly, Monica Sjoo etc. – too many second wave feminist scholars to mention. I was also deeply enmeshed in the study of world mythologies, becoming a Jungian pattern analyst in the process. Re- discovering Mary as Goddess set me on a path that culminated in Carol Christ’s and Marija Gimbutas’ work.  I had found a home with women at last.

After accruing degrees I taught Women’s Studies at University,  became a hospice volunteer, worked at the Abused Women’s Advocacy project and with artists and writers in a Jungian context until I realized that Jungians spent too much time in their heads without attention to body.

 I advocated fiercely and tirelessly for feminism and feminists, dedicated to being of service to all women, sculpting images of the goddess, speaking out and writing at first intellectually and later using my own experiences as a woman to uncover what it meant to be a female living in this culture.

 Since I have always been an outsider when the second wave of feminism collapsed the acute loneliness returned although I continued to embrace feminism through writing and with friendships with online women friends.

 One year ago, on new year’s day, I had a terrifying dream of a wild cat striking in the dark. I had already noted that some patriarchal women were very attached to cats. Cats are predators, secretive, and do strike without warning. I knew from experience having had these animals too. The wild Lynx that appeared outside my window on the second day of January did nothing to ease my fright. My dream and day reality were merging.

Less than three months later, on ‘good’ Friday, Cruella Deville struck with a vengeance. This woman destroyed a friendship of thirty-five years and then having orchestrated the betrayal could not let go. Months later she sent me a lump of coal, which I found ridiculous, even funny having already taken appropriate action, and having let go of this control freak of a woman and her husband who turned out to be a coward. I will continue to hold this woman accountable for her betrayal until it seems no longer necessary. I refuse to wear the ‘victim hood’. 

 That first monstrous experience was followed by others. With each betrayal I repeatedly owned my 50 percent, dealt with residual anger without striking out, let go, reminding myself that all women were fallible. My position as an eco- feminist remained secure.

 I am politically and socially an independent refusing to embrace ideologies of any kind but never considered feminism as an ideology because I am not a radical feminist. I believe most women and men are caught in a 5000 year old patriarchal system that we can’t escape. It’s important to add that I also believe that women and nature have been tarred with the same brush. Woman and Earth abuse are legendary.  These are facts not opinion.

I have held this perspective until recently. The last two woman betrayals have been at the hands of feminists in positions of power, one whose friendship I once cherished (the day this betrayal occurred I dreamed that I had been hit by a bright red truck that was also a cat). Each put me over the edge. In both cases I did nothing to bring on such cruelty (no 50 percent).  Worse, neither of these women were accountable for their betrayals never uttering a word of acknowledgement or apology – they left me for dead – diminished and invisible.

Struck down with grief I was forced to examine my now troubled relationship to feminism. Maybe I wasn’t a feminist after all? Maybe I had unknowingly adopted a feminist ideology that didn’t include what real women did. Maybe my loyalty was misplaced?

Help arrived almost immediately as two compassionate feminists acknowledged the harm done and stood up for me reversing the feelings of powerlessness and loneliness that flooded me. A third was supportive but took no action on my behalf.

These compassionate caring women gave me a priceless gift – their support which helped me to recover the feminist in me! Any feminist who stands up for another woman is by extension standing up for all of us. What could be more important?

Just after these two betrayals occurred, I found what I thought was an injured wild mourning dove in the grass. Oh, I went to pick up the bird, touched and stroked her before she flew away much to my astonishment. The next night I had exactly the same experience. I have always loved doves and live with telepathic Lily b, a ring-necked dove who is almost 35 so I was on high alert. I had no idea why these wild doves let me touch their silky mole brown feathers with spots and spidery pink legs. but I felt witnessed and cared about by these birds as each stared through me with one beady eye. Weren’t they re-affirming what the compassionate women said and did? I believed so.

 Surely the Dove Goddess had manifested to weave my feminist self back into the whole. Each aspect of this multifaceted experience returned my sense of self to me in different ways. I applauded the women’s courage, especially the ones who spoke out on my behalf.

I can now state with conviction that I am an almost eighty-one-year-old feminist who is committed to other women and to the Goddess who loves us all.

‘Mother of Muses, sing for me
Sing of the mountains and the deep dark sea…

 Mother of Muses, sing for us all

Mother of Muses, sing for our hearts…

‘Mother of Muses, sing for me
Sing of the mountains and the deep dark sea…

(words adapted from a song by Bob Dylan)

May the Muses sing for us all.