From: mfterman@phoenix.princeton.edu (Mutant for Hire)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: Mythopoetic Groups
Date: 13 Dec 1992 17:24:32 GMT
Organization: Mutant for Hire, Inc.
Distribution: world
Reply-To: mfterman@phoenix.princeton.edu (Mutant for Hire)
NNTP-Posting-Host: remarque.berkeley.edu
Originator: muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu

In article <1gd2hsINNnn@agate.berkeley.edu>, sfjr@wam.umd.edu (Steve Russell) writes:
>1.  These "men's" groups seem almost the same as the various "goddess-
>    religions" being created by some feminists.  Why do some feminists
>    criticize these groups so heavily?

Since I'm not a woman, I can't make any claims, and no doubt any two
women in the feminist movement would probably give you a different answer
such as "I don't criticize" or "I criticize because...". I do have a
couple of ideas.

Since male social groups have been formed in the past to exclude women
>from power, some are leery about any new groups being formed that don't
include women for the same reason. In the past, lots of valuable business
and connections are formed at private clubs to which only men were
members, even though the avowed purpose is relatively benign.

>2.  These groups function on the seemingly reasonable assumption that
>    same sex individuals need to bond more then they do in ordingary
>    life.  Im not sure I believe this.  I make friends,(male or female)
>    through my various hobbies.  I find the needs I have met by these
>    arent supplied exclusively ( or close) by one sex or the other.
>    If it was so, why couldnt I just make friends with men through my
>    hobbies?  What do I gain from the "mythopoetic" aspects of going
>    out in the woods are worshipping sex organs etc etc?

Well, I've been reading up on my mythology, Parsifal et al, and I don't
feel any real urge to go worship any phallus. Some people don't need
that sort of bonding, other people feel a need to form close ties to
members of their own gender for resonance and understanding.

>3.  It seems to my view that many problems have been self-created for
>    human's by engaging in myth making/religion building for the past
>    several thousand years.  Isnt it illogical to solve the problem
>    of stereotypes/edicts from these things by going out and inventing
>    more of them?  

I still haven't read Jung yet, so we'll see how much any of my
attitudes change after I read him, but I'll risk an answer despite my
lack of psych and anthro readings. First off, most of the problems
you mention are due to people reading metaphors literally, taking the
symbol instead of what the symbol is pointing to.

Second off, people have spiritual needs, or most people have them. By
spiritual, the more scientific and analytic may call "psychological".
Myths can go in and work on the psyche in powerful ways. A person
prays to Jesus to free him from the temptation to gamble. It works
and he feels able to not gamble. Now if you don't believe in Jesus,
you can look at him trying to identify with and transfer to himself
the qualities of a given symbol for various ideals he believes in.

People have to believe in something. Choosing a story of someone
battling evils in themselves and in the world around them and coming
out on top is a good a thing to believe in as anything. Lots of the
problems with myths come from the excess baggage that comes with the
myth or believing that their myth is the only one that is valid.

[don't worry, I'm going to try to bring feminism back into this
eventually]

>4.  By #3, wouldnt people be better off if they looked at themselves
>    and the world as is?  Why do we need to become "The Great Hunter"
>    or "The Healing Woman"?  Why cant we be just "Harry The Accountant"
>    or "Lisa The Lawyer"?  This may seem trite but it looks like if
>    you want to change yourself/society you first have to live with
>    yourself/society, not putting on war paint once a week or making
>    rituals to nonexistent goddesses.

Okay, the first problem is that you are reading this sucker literally.
What is it to be a hunter? A hunter hunts, and its generally in the
myths something that needs to be hunted, like a deer for food or some
monster that needs destroying. By identifying with the hunter, some
men can renew their purpose of working to earn money for food, or to
gain the will and the courage to attack some problem or injustice in
the world that is bothering them. If you are an accountant, I can
certainly see how you'd need some external inspiration for the former.

Likewise Lisa the Lawyer may be sick of the law, hating all the
endless paperwork, the endless litigation, the clients she has to
work with. She goes to a rite for the goddess, and starts identifying
with the Healer. All of a sudden, she wants to be a healer, and to
use the law to help people and heal their problems.

These are two hypothetical examples, but they're really just varients
of the numerous stories of people who have been down and out, found
Jesus and are now out going around helping people and trying to save
them from the evils that beset them.

Now we get back to modern culture, and back to the topic of this
newgroup which we lost somewhere in the previous paragraphs. The main
problem I have with a lot of the modern pagan rituals, for men and
women, is that they are using old rituals which were conceived in a
much different place, but filtering them through our culture, which
can destroy some of their effectiveness.

Back in the old old days, men and women had vastly different roles
in life, and the myths reflected that. That part is changing now.
Many women identify with the heroic quest stories, which traditionally
have male characters in them, since going into the business world and
surviving often has elements that relate to such a quest. So we need
some new mythology to reflect this new role for women as we have for
the old role of the healer/nurturer/keeper of secrets. Not to mention
finding a symbolic system more natural for our technological and
multicultural age.

Should men and women have the same myths? Well, no, people always have
an easier time where the lead character is someone they can identify
with, that that generally means gender. Also, men have their phallus,
and women have menstration, which are key symbols that have special
meaning for each gender through personal experience.

Coed rituals? Quite possibly it would be a good thing, to remind each
gender of the other and of the sexuality that is a product of what
goes on between the two. Sexuality, along with death, frequently crops
up in the old myths, and its something that is worth digging up,
especially give this culture's strange attitude towards sex. Of course
lesbians and gay men have a different perspective, and would require
some of their own rituals around sexuality.

But yes, I think that having all men rituals and all women rituals for
religious fufillment aren't bad things so long as you don't
exclusively practice them. Social groups where one gender is free of
another is not a bad thing. Separatism has its time and place, so long
as its not ongoing.

-- 
    Martin Terman, Mutant for Hire, Mean Ol' Top, Priest of Shub-Internet
    Disclaimer: Nobody else takes me seriously, why should you be the first?
mfterman@phoenix.princeton.edu mfterman@pucc.bitnet terman@pupgga.princeton.edu
"Sig quotes are like bumper stickers, only without the same sense of relevance"
-- 
Post articles to soc.feminism, or send email to feminism@ncar.ucar.edu.
Questions and comments should be sent to feminism-request@ncar.ucar.edu.  This
newsgroup is moderated by several people, so please use the mail aliases. Your
article should be posted within several days.  Rejections notified by email.