OLD IS NOT THE PROBLEM?

Published March 11, 2024 by Nan Mykel

What’s wrong with women that we’re so easily abused and misused? It may be because we’re physically weaker than men, pushovers, literally. Is our empathy so easy to use against us? I hear “lady like” more often than “gentleman like.” Does the role of nurturer/caretaker overshadow other areas of life? What was behind the difficulty in letting us vote? Why were white women allowed to vote before women of color? What is the source of prejudice? Surely not fear. Allah (swt) says in the Quran, “O believers treat women with kindness even if you dislike them.”!! [That doesn’t exactly put women on a par with men!] In addition/as a result, many women have bought into seeing themselves as less.

According to Wikipedia, Males on average are more assertive and have higher self-esteem. Females were on average higher than males in extroversion, anxiety, trust, and, especially, tender-mindedness (e.g., nurturance).

After reflecting for most of today and reading on this topic (suffrage, Islam’s treatment of women, abortions outlawed in much of U.S., and FGM–female genital mutilation–in other countries–I was interested to see on a post from O.U. what appeared to be a woman’s view of her Muslim life: “Thus, in the Islamic tradition, a woman has an independent identity. She is a responsible being in her own right and carries the burden of her moral and spiritual obligations. Women have as much right to education as men do.” Why do I feel like a well-behaved Muslim woman wrote that, defensively?

I sought an additional version from the International Islamic University Malaysia https://www.iium.edu.my› articles: “What is a woman’s role in Islam? Men are providers for women and in exchange for support, women should be obedient and serve their husbands. They should keep their virginity and after marriage, loyalty, chastity and complete dedication to their husbands are prerequisite for securing maintenance. Women are seen as weak and as easily overpowered by men. (“Women in the Quran and the Sunnah – IIUM”)

During this long afternoon it occurs to me that the unspoken sentiment behind the complaints that “Biden’s too old” really is that no one’s willing to say it out loud without seeming prejudiced: Being too old means that he might die in office, leaving a female of color in his place. Biden can’t say it, nor can Democrats, without being seen as racist and/or misogynist. So everyone is quiet about it–at least in the print I saw (or didn’t see), and the [imagined?] concern is not being addressed. Republicans are also avoiding the “prejudiced” label, at least in their public proclamations. It almost makes me wish she’d bow out, but don’t tell her I said that! [“Any vote not cast for Biden is a vote for Trump.”]

Google describes Kamala Harris, the current U.S. Vice President under Joe Biden, as the first woman, second bi-racial, (Charles Curtis, a member of the Caw Nation served under Hoover), and the first South Asian American vice president. (She was born in the United States!} Her mother was a Tamil Brahmin, part of a “privileged elite” in Hinduism’s ancient caste hierarchy, but moved from India to the United States and received her PhD. at Berkeley in 1964. Now deceased, her mother became a biomedical scientist. Her father is Donald Jasper Harris (born August 23, 1938), a Jamaican-American economist and professor emeritus at Stanford University. Her parents divorced in 1971, after eight years.

How to deal with this problem? P.S. I’m 88+, so Biden’s just a kid to me.

WE WOMEN CAN STILL VOTE

Published September 25, 2022 by Nan Mykel

A male candidate for Michigan’s 3rd Congressional District once said the US suffered from women’s suffrage and praised an organization trying to repeal the 19th Amendment. Of course he denies that is his current belief, but you might guess which side of the great divide he is still on. But we can still vote, so let’s do it!!

A friend recently said that he formerly had some hope that women would get more active and improve the political scene, but that since some of them have been so frequently quoted in the news he had lost hope they would save democracy. (I earlier promised I would not say their names so as not to increase their fame.) I looked up the stats and it was difficult to quickly understand the results of women voters pro and con Biden. (Again, ignoring the “T” word.)

We women sure aren’t perfect. In fact, a goodly portion of us have feet of clay (remember all the swooners over Frank Sinatra?) And there was the woman who, when asked what the last administration had done for her, said, “I don’t know but every time I look at Him I feel warm all over.”

It was in Atlanta during the earlier days of NOW when I attended a large meeting of a re-invigorated women’s movement, possibly of NOW or some similar new organizational movement. I had envisioned we would witness a good mutually supportive presentation. After all, aren’t we the warm, caring empathic sex? But the first two presenters made what I considered snide, competitive remarks about each other. I’d forgotten that many of us are easily swayed and have been “trying to be men,” both at the workplace and “socially.” A woman may fight for orgasms in print, but then lose herself in the presence of masculinity. I have also read that many feminists resent transgender women. Do I sound disillusioned? I know myself, and how nonassertive I’ve been all my life, but …..

At least a number of women melt around men and surrender their common sense. Remember all the talk about “dumb blondes?” I’m sure I’ll regret this post, but the number of vocal women willing to discount the lives of other women via the abortion issue is truly disheartening. Have a heart, women! Have a heart! How could we put the very life of a woman at risk for the uncertain appearance of a possible person, even when it’s fathered by forcible rape and even if it puts her own life on the line?

It appears that a majority of the MAGA women are racists, and can intellectually ignore the fact that more people of color have abortions than others. Do they realize that the possible foetus may be a person of color? The vision of a new generation of children whose mothers didn’t want them gives me chills. i heard one elected woman say the foetus should be allowed to grow up and “maybe cure cancer.” Surely that’s a “dumb blonde” statement? Because we’re not strong physically doesn’t mean we have to buy into being weak-kneed intellectually.

Perhaps we women could profit from meditating regularly on our breath and the light? What glory an army of potentialized women could do for O Beautiful, For Spacious Skies?

PLAYING WITH FIRE

Published August 18, 2022 by Nan Mykel

Irreparable harm appears to lie in wait for us if the Republican shenanigans take hold in our country. The situation gets wilder and wilder with the passage of time and the approach of elections. I speak of what is being done to the ragtag of our public schools and the profession of medicine. I don’t refer to the Mir-a-lego combustion. Hopefully that is being attended to elsewhere.

My first concern is the eradication of sex education in the public schools. Why did we ever begin sex education? All those issues will become caustic again. What is this? Along with forbidden abortions we’re not going to warn children? How dark! Not only did unwanted pregnancies cry out for sex education, but also vulnerability to child sexual abuse. “A third of sexually abused children are abused before the age of nine.” (Finkelhor, 1986, p 229). “Stranger danger” wasn’t a joke.

Equally as nervy and destructive is attacking the physician’s time-worn oath to “do no harm.” If recently passed state prohibitions prevail, some states will find themselves with a crippling doctor shortage. (I’m trying not to say, “and it serves them right.”) “If you see a fleeing of providers from states that have severely restricted their ability to practice in line with their moral compass and medical ethics, it will be a huge loss to public and community health,” said Jamila Perritt, an abortion provider in Washington, D.C., and the president and CEO of Physicians for Reproductive Health. “We don’t have to guess what’s going to happen. We already see the high rates of maternal mortality and morbidity in places like Louisiana and Mississippi. But we’ll see much more of that as these bans continue to sweep the country.”

IF YOU BELIEVE THIS, GO…..

Published August 11, 2022 by Nan Mykel

STAND IN THE CORNER…

Republicans in Congress argued that none of these bills are necessary because the right to birth control and the right to same-sex marriage are safe. “In no way, shape or form is access to contraception limited or at risk of being limited,” Rep. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.) said during Thursday’s debate on the birth control bill. “The liberal majority is clearly trying to stoke fears and mislead the American people once again because in their minds stoking fear clearly is the only way that they can win.” (Yahoo News)

“The FBI has gone rogue and is doing the dirty work of a communist regime,” tweeted Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA).

Boebert “In Venezuela, they eat the dogs, and it started because they do not have firearms to protect themselves, to defend themselves against a tyrannical government.”

“We save the babies, we’ll save America,” Mike Pence told conservative youth.

At least Bostelman apologized: So easy to repeat motivated misunderstandings: A Nebraska state lawmaker apologized on Monday after he publicly cited a persistent but debunked rumor alleging that schools are placing litter boxes in school bathrooms to accommodate children who self-identify as cats. State senator Bruce Bostelman, a conservative Republican, repeated the false claim during a public, televised debate on a bill intended to help school children who have behavioral problems. His comments quickly went viral, with one Twitter video garnering more than 300,000 views as of Monday afternoon, and drew an onslaught of online criticism and ridicule. Bostelman initially said he was “shocked” when he heard stories that children were dressing as cats and dogs while at school, with claims that schools were accommodating them with litter boxes.

Sorry, I can’t handle any more at present…..

Friend Felix Speaks Again

Published July 19, 2022 by Nan Mykel

4th of JULY: GOOD GRIEF!

If you like pretty poems, please look away,

for here I lament decay, dying and death.

I’m not bemoaning my dying contemporaries,

who lately fall like old-growth trees in a forest.

Nor do I pre-grieve my own impending death.

My concern is for the fate of our democracy,

as it is doing a dangerous dance with doom.

Our precious political freedoms are eroding.

Our fractured center seems not to be holding.

Our democracy could be in its death throes.

Female bodily autonomy has been outlawed,

voting rights have been wantonly suppressed,

there is massive support for Trump’s Big Lie.

The Supreme Court defies the majority’s will.

Throughout our land gun fetishism flourishes.

Louder liars shout down the voices of veracity.

Violence grows, the environment degrades.

This Independence Day is a day of gloom.

Sadly I fly our tattered flag upside down.

Today I can’t sing Happy Birthday America!

In these dark days, I weep as I sing of thee.

Felix Gagliano, July 2022

I WON’T REPEAT THE NEWS OF THE DAY, BUT…

Published June 24, 2022 by Nan Mykel

Heaven forbid, what threat is being held over our Attorney

General’s head? Whether you believe or not, pray.

Love, Nan

HO HO!

Published February 6, 2019 by Nan Mykel

“Can you type?”

“No.”

“Can you file?”

“No.”

“Can you take shorthand?”

“No.”

“How about simple bookkeeping?”

“No.”

“What on earth can you do?”

“Everything you can!”

The above was discovered in a delightful 1970 book of poetry, Come Into the Mountains, Dear Friend, by Susan Polis Schutz Blue Mountain Arts, Inc.

Image: Pexels

As One of You Observed: Yes I do long for a Group

Published January 23, 2019 by Nan Mykel

My current posting on facebook:

What’s happened to Face Book? Unexplained (to me) Changes

New fiends (Freudian error, I promise) have unexpectedly been added. I’m not agin’ them, I just don’t know them. Yet. Looks like I will soon, tho.

I sat down to tap out the announcement that I’m contemplating starting a new group. It will begin the Sunday during

I wonder if…

which the first person joins. Don’t call me, please. I prefer e-mails, I even answer them. I’m deaf and tongue-tied on the phone, as many marketers will vouch. Re the envisioned weekly group, tentatively known as the confidential Women’s Poetry Support Group:

Membership initially limited from 2 to 12 females by birth or choice. Time one hour with freedom always to go longer. Revolving leadership after group has solidified. Members will either bring a poem they have currently or formerly authored which either expresses or elicits feelings. Ideally members would provide readable copies of their poem so members can read and listen at the same time. Group will begin with each member stating how they are feeling at the moment, and the immediate antecedents. Goal is growth rather than fixing, like the spirit of the former women’s consciousness raising groups. Rudeness, aggression, hostility, put-downs or non-acceptance will be greeted with the banging of metal on metal (spoons battering pans).

Preference will be given to those not currently in another poetry group. The group will not aim to siphon off other poetry group’s members. I hope to meet in my apartment Sunday nights at 7 pm; parking across the street at the credit union.

Obviously there will be no videotaping of meetings. nmykel@gmail.com

belliboneone re-blog on transgender vulnerability

Published March 22, 2018 by Nan Mykel

Remembering our Dead, February 2018

Earlier today I received a call from a dear friend, another transgender woman. Some weeks back, two trans women she knew went missing. Their bodies were recently found and have now been identified.

THIS is what happens to people like me in this country based on hatred and violence.

THIS is what happens to people like me in this country where it is just fine to treat my existence as a joke.

THIS is what happens to people like me in a world where I am not entitled to dignity, where my most profound inner experience of who I am is blithely brushed aside as a whim or a lifestyle choice.

THIS is what happens to people like me when my life has no value whatsoever.

We wind up murdered in garbage bags.

You want to know why the real murder rate of trans women is much, much higher than the numbers cited on Days of Remembrance? Look no further.

One of the victims, who was also very definitely a trans woman, was identified by the police and the press as a man and called by her dead name, which I refuse to write here. They are using an old picture of her, one that was probably provided by her family.

I imagine that her family is insisting on the misgendering and the use of her dead name and the use of an image she would have found profoundly abhorrent in ways that cisgender people can never understand.

I suppose her family won in the end.

Even in death she is not allowed to be who she was. The friend who called me, who has good reason not to trust her relatives, says she is going to burn the remaining pictures she has from her old life.

I have a request. If I am murdered, please let me be me.