As the mythology research continues, there is something I just have to say.
(And I realize saying this practically makes Athena my personal savior, and it’s good she has a big shield so when the feminists come out and pelt me I have something to hide behind.)
When researching Greek mythology, you find out this: there was this sweet pastoral culture in place in the Aegean peninsula where everyone got along and cultivated the land together in small, close knit communities. And everyone worshipped the Great Mother Goddess as the earth, as the giver of food and life, and as the representation of all that there was in the universe. And things were lovely and then the MEAN EVIL HUNTERS INVADED with their storm god and their brutish customs and cut and hacked their bloody way through the Mother Goddess Civilization of Light and Goodness.
Ok, it doesn’t get put quite like that. At least, not by most scholars. Mostly. The particular thing that irks me is that the Neolithic village society is called matriarchal, and the Paleolithic hunter-gather conquering warrior society is called patriarchal. And then we get the whole centuries of matriarchal repression by patriarchal societies statements, and the “movements” to go back to a matriarchal/Goddess culture, because clearly that was better–or at least less bloody.
And maybe it *was* better. But “matriarchal” implies that one sex had all the power while the other was subjugated. It implies that the universe is a better place when it is looked at through a paradigm of femininity. I’m sorry; how is this better than a patriarchy? Where are men supposed to fit in and be ok being male? The “way men are” doesn’t cause atrocity: fear does. And if you look at the right sources, (try Armstrong’s A Short History of Myth
) you’ll learn that in order for the Goddess to be the earth that sustains and gives life, she must be impregnated by the Sky God (yay rain!) for her to bring forth the miracle of growth from the nothingness.
See?! Both elemental energies working together. *That* is a right way, I think. So can we please stop being sore over the MEAN EVIL patriarchy that’s been so MEAN and EVIL? And instead of trying to smother everything over with Goddessy-goodness as backlash, let’s focus on making room for everybody. Something which might maybe could begin with changing our terminology to stop emulating the war of the sexes.
