04-26 TABLE of CONTENTS:
Salic Law Says No Woman to Rule France
Housewife Invented portable ice cream freezer
First Australian woman to Win Olympic Gold in Field and
Track
Naitto first woman to perfect the forward somersault on
the tightwire
DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and
EVENTS
QUOTES by
Elizabeth Janeway, Anita Loos, Dorothy Allison, Taslima Nasrin, and Salman
Rushdie.
Salic Law Said No Women as Rulers of France, but Women are
All Over History as Ruling Regents
France was ruled by the Salic Law that stated no
woman should rule France - but there were a number of women who were regents
and ruled in place of their minor sons. They just didn't get the title
(nor do historians give them the title.)
One such woman (non-ruling queen) was Maria DeMedici,
queen consort of King Henry IV of France who ruled as regent 1610 through
1614 following her husband's death and the minority of her son, the future
king.
MdM chose de Richelieu as a royal advisor and was responsible
for his red hat. She also advised her son to adopt Richelieu as an advisor.
As a reward, Richelieu turned on her and she died destitute in virtual
exile.
Perhaps there were causes for her downfall and perhaps
not. But she was certainly not any worse that the majority of kings. But
history is always rather vague on some things, but then:
History has said she was not a good ruler - but then
history says she didn't exist as a ruler. How can the historians have it
both ways?
The law in many nations (primogeniture) allows only
males to inherit (thus legal stealing from wives and daughters who were
often left destitute when the eldest son or male relative inherites all
lands and money, even those belonging before marriage to the wife). This
primogeniture clause still controls many ancient estates in Europe, especially
England, in the 21st century. It was in place in the early days of the
colonial and theUnited States.
There is also a set of legal thinking/ laws that prevents
a woman from ascending the throne as monarch or from a man inheriting the
throne through a female ancestor.
In general these ideas follow the ancient Germanic
Salic Law of Succession, although brought to a high art in France where
the rule is derived from the Lex Salica, or the law of the Salian Franks.
Some had thought the Salic law was derived from the
Roman (which kept women as legal minors) but Germanics appear to have developed
the ideas independently although no one knows how much traveling (trading)
there was between various tribes. Modern DNA investigation it appears women
moved across much vaster areas than previously imagined supporting the
supposition of trade with the resultant exchange of ideas.
The problem of no son to inherit in France did not
become a problem until the early 14th century - and the no woman allowed
was quickly carved into legal stone as was the ban on any man claiming
the throne if he was descended on the female side.
Some claim the exclusion of women was because of the
sometimes dual role of kings as priests or heads of churches - and women
have always been specifically excluded from priesthood by most male godhead
religions. However, it probably rose from the male idea that he controls
his wife and therefor any husband would control a queen which ties into
the long-standing male opinion that women have no minds.
The first official use of the Salic Law was to prevent
the ascension of the Spanish child Isabella in 1593. She was the
granddaughter of Henry II of France through his daughter's marriage to
to the King of Spain.
Once used, the Salic Law that was so beneficial to
men became permanent.
It blossomed into a statement to the effect that France
was too (fair) precious (beautiful) to be ruled by a woman.
In England and many other nations there was no Salic
Law but they did have the rule that all sons regardless of age were above
all daughters in the line of succession. Thus in England the very young
teenager Edward inherited the throne from Henry VIII. After Edward's death,
his much older sister Mary ascended the throne and then at her death
(also without "an issue") her younger sister and the last of
Henry's children, Elizabeth I became queen.
And there were lots of arguments about that line because
of Henry's many marriages.
In Spain, women were queens until Philip V the invoked
his own version of the Salic Law in a 1712 decree.
In Russia, women easily ascended the throne, sometimes
they were not even related to the late Czar, until an angry, women-hating
grandson of a woman czar (she made him behave) barred all women from the
throne when he became czar in the 19th century.
The Salic Law although first recorded in Latin is
seen to have originated around the 6th century. It was perfected under
Charlemagne and his successors as it went through a number of revisions.
The original Salic Law was more a legal outline for crimes but did contain
the rule that daughters could not inherit land (since husband's were given
complete and total control of their wives' money).
The French kings then interpreted (some say incorrectly)
the stricture to included inheritance of rulership. But as we all know,
the winners get to make the rules and women were barred from the monarchy.
Ironically, less than 17 years after the Salic Law
was used in France to bar Isabella of Spain from ascending the throne,
Maria de Medici became ruling regent.
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Nammu is the primeval earth goddess of Sumerian
mythology.
|
In 1846 New Jersey housewife Nancy Johnson invented a portable,
hand-cranked ice cream freezer which she called the Johnson Ice-Cream Freezer.
HerJohnson Patent Ice-Cream Freezer would be patented in 1848 by inventor
William G. Young.
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Nelson First Australian woman to Win Olympic Gold in Field
and Track
Marjorie Jackson Nelson of Australia, honored as one of Australia's
living legends, won two gold medals at 1952 Olympics at Helsinki when only
17 years of age.
She won the 100m sprint and the 200m sprint. Not only
was she the first Australian woman to win an Olympic gold in field and
track but she was also the first Australian (male or female) to win a medal
in field and track.
The overwhelming Australian presence in the Olympics
postdated Nelson's astounding wins. Her victories and the resulting worldwide
publicity probably inspired the resultant rush to Olympic gold by Australians.
She was known as the Lithgow Flash as she won every
major running event in the sprints. She has devoted her entire life to
forwarding sports in Australia and a broad number of civic projects.
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Ala Naitto First Woman to Perfect Forward Somersault on the
Tightwire
Ala Naitto, an Italian-American tightwire performer, was one
of the first woman to perfect the forward somersault on the tightwire.
Until Ala Naitto did it, the feat had been accomplished
by only one man, Australia's Con Colleano - and it was "assumed"
no women could do it..
Ala Naitto, who was adopted by the Naittos troup, was
seldom allowed to perform the feat in public, the troup preferring their
natural daughter Nina to do it. Nina was adept at the backward somersault
but the forward somersault sometimes took her as many as 11 tries before
she successfully completed it.
Ala Naitto was known in America as "The
Female Colleano."
According to her obituary in Great Britain (although
she lived in the U.S, and died in Florida at 76 in 1997):
"Ala Naitto achieved some extraordinary balancing
feats - handstanding on the head ofher partner, Nio; standing on her shoulders
to juggle rings; headstanding on Nio's head while she walked up a flight
of steps, across the thin wire and down the steps on the other side. No
other women in the circus have performed these feats."
Ala Naitto was born in Russia in 1920, and adopted
into the Chinese-Russian Naitto circus and theatre troupe at the age of
seven, according to the Electronic Telegraph obituary.
The troup left Russia and in 1932 was performing in
Germany, then in Great Britain. Later they moved to the United States and
became part of the Ringling Brothers circus. The troupe was featured in
several movies in UK as well as the U.S.
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04-26 DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and
EVENTS
Click
on image to see full-size version
Event 04-26-1777: Sybil Ludington, age 16, rode through towns
in New York and Connecticut to warn that the Redcoats were coming...
the redcoats were coming to Danbury, CN. All very Paul Reverish, except
Sybil completed HER ride, and SHE thus gathered enough volunteers to help
beat back the British the next day.
Her ride was twice the distance of Revere's. No poet
immortalized (and faked) her accomplishments. Revere did NOT complete his
ride; two other men actually did most of the warning ride.
Her hometown was renamed after her. However, recently
the National Rifle Association established a Sybil Ludington women's "freedom"
award for meritorious service in furthering the purposes of the NRA as
well as use of firearms in competition or in actual life threatening situations
although Sybil did not carry nor ever fired a gun. Also, some HIStorians
have proved to their satisfaction that the Ludington story is *not* accurate.
B. 04-26-1795, Frances Manwaring Caulkins - U.S.author.
B. 04-26-1820, Alice Cary - U.S. author.
AC collaborated with her sister Phoebe on volumes of
poetry as well as writing essays, sketches and other works.
They are not considered major writers, but they were
well respected in their time.Their home in New York was a meeting palce
for many literary figures.
Alice served as the first president of Sorosis, the
pioneer women's club founded by Jane Croly.
Sister Phoebe whose poems are now more admired than
Alice's for their depth did not accomplish as much in the way of writing
since she was in charge of keeping the house (her choice).
Both women were staunch supporters of women's rights
and Phoebe served on the Stanton-Anthony Revolution magazine.
Among Alice's books were two volumes of reminiscent
sketches entitled Clovernook Papers (1852/1853), Hagar, a Story
of To-day (1852), Lyra and Other Poems (1852), The Maiden
Oftiascala (1855), The Clovernook Children (1855), Married,
Not Mated (1856), Pictures of Country Life (1859), Ballads,
Lyrics, and Hymns (1866), Snowberries: a Book for Young Folks
(1867), The Bishop's Son (1867), and The Lover's Diary (1868).
B. 04-26-1828, Martha Finley - U.S. author. MF was denigrated
in her lifetime by male critics who snidely sneered at her for her "womanly
writings."
Without their approval, she still produced more than
100 works that sold extremely well, including the immensely popular Elsie
The Dinsmore series that is still in print more than
150 years later. Her writing brought her fame and fortune, so, as the saying
goes, the best revenge (to the critics) is living well.
B. 04-26-1836, Erminnie Adele Platt Smith - U.S. anthropologist
who studied the Iroquis Indian culture, gathering their legends and language.
Her ethnographic studies surpassed any others in the field.
She started off after her degree at Troy Seminary in
Troy, New York and further studies in Germany. She was primarily a geologist
who at about age 40 organized the Aesthetic Society that had as many as
500 in her parlor meetings about scient, literature, and art. It was at
one of the meeting that she heard about the new field of anthropology.
Her studies of the Iroquois Federation enabled her to preserve a large
segment of their legends and language. She wrote numerous scientic papers
with Myths of the Iroquois (1883) as her best known book
B. 04-26-1875, Natalia Curtis - U.S. musicologist, particularly
of Indian music.
NC went to the pueblos of the New Mexico/Arizona Indians
to record on site. Through her influence with President Teddy Roosevelt,
the ban against Indians performing their music was lifted. Her The Indians
Book (1907) remains an important source for students of Indian culture.
By 1911 she had turned to studying and transcribing
Black music and published the major four-volume Hampton Series Negro
Folk Songs (1918- 1919) as well as other books.
[WOAH note - Overlooked in most U.S.
histories is the fact that the U.S. government tried to destroy the Indian
culture by forbidding them access to their rituals, religion, and music.
The U.S. government bodily shipped thousands of Indian children away from
the reservations and their families, sending them to cities where they
had no access to their heritage. No people have suffered more at the hands
of the U.S. population that North American Indians and the genocide of
millions of Western Hemisphere Indians that preceded the cultural blackout.
The WOAH compiler has been in several western Indian pueblos and on several
eastern reservations and as a white face never felt a moment of fear although
she knew that few people have suffered as much as the American Indians.
They are remarkable people.]
B. 04-26-1878, Ethel Griffies - British actor who became the
world's oldest living, performing actress. EG started her career in 1881
and was still on Broadway in 1967 at age 86.
B. 04-26-1882, Jesie Redmon Fauset - U.S. black editor, teacher,
and writer. JRF was probably the first black women to receive the Phi
Beta Kappa.
Because of her fine writing ability, W. E. B. DuBois
invited her to join the NAACP staff as literary editor of its publication
Crisis.
Fauset then played a major role in the literary tradition
of the Harlem Renaissance by encouraging young writers. Her much praised
personal writings often dealt with racial prejudice. She was a high school
teacher and after her marriage she stopped her activism.
B. 04-26-1886, Gertrude Pridgett "Ma" Rainey, one of the
true greats of the Negro Minstrel shows when they were a true art form.
She is considered the mother of what has evolved into modern blues singing.
She developed the blues from various threads of African
music she heard in her native Missouri.
Ma Rainey recorded at least 92 songs as a blues singer.
Always helping, she gave Bessie Smith her start. Rainey is gradually being
recognized as one of the most important influences in the transition from
African music to jazz.
B. 04-26-1893, Anita Loos - U.S. actor, film producer, screenwriter,
playwright and novelist.
Her fabulously popular Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
(1925) which went through more than 85 editions (plus a 1949 Broadway play
and a 1953 Hollywood movie). He followup book But Gentlemen Marry Brunettes
(1928) was less popular.
AL wrote extensively for the stage, as well as novels,
and completed two autobiographies. She got her start in 1916 she wrote
the first dialogue titles for silent films
B. 04-26-1895, Dorothy Varian - U.S. artist. Her well- known
works include: "Sandra in a Pink Slip" and "Interior with
Stone and Nude".
B. 04-26-1907, Julia Godman Ruuttila - U.S. union organizer.
The following was written by Sandy Polishuk (who is
writing a book about Ruuttila):
"Julia Godman Ruuttila helped
organize the International Woodworkers of America (IWA) in Oregon mills
and was the first president of its ladies' auxiliary. In the late `30s
she founded the Free Ray Becker Committee (FRBC) to win the release of
the last IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) martyr of the "Centralia
Massacre" (a fatal confrontation between the IWW and the American
Legion in Centralia, Washington, in 1919).
"In order to mobilize support for Ray Becker,
she began writing for the IWA newspaper, launching a career as a journalist
and investigative reporter that would continue until 1987. She also wrote
poetry and novels. In addition to the FRBC, Ruuttila was active in numerous
defense committees. She was secretary of the Committee for Protection of
Foreign Born, fighting deportation of foreign-born union activists, which
earned her a subpoena to HUAC (House Committee on Un-American Activities)
in 1956.
"Throughout her life Ruuttila was active in civil
liberties,civil rights, and peace organizations, and in drawing the labor
movement into these struggles. She participated in lunch-counter protests
to remove Oregon's 'White Trade Only' signs and fought against racism in
the union movement.
"She was active in the Democratic Party and the
ladies' auxiliary of the ILWU (International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's
Union).
"She died in Alaska in 1991."
B. 04-26-1909, Margaret Blackwood - Australian educator, botanist
and geneticist. She received the MBE, DBE in 1981.
She served in the WAAF 1941-1946 during World War II
rising to wing officer.
B. 04-26-1908, Gale Wilhelm - U.S. author of the lesbian classics
WeToo Are Drifting and Torchlight to Valhalla both published
by mainline New York publishers in the 1930s.
The latter was supposedly the first lesbian mainstream
novel where the lesbians were allowed to be happy at the end although most
publicists insist that Claire Morgan's Price of Salt was the first.
"She wanted to melt and
pour herself around Morgen like wax."
B. 04-26-1914, Lilian Vera (Lilian Verna) Rolfe - French World War
II hero.
Her family had relocated to South America from France
before World War II. There, she wa asked to report on German shipping in
Rio de Janeiro while she was working for the British Embassy.
She was accepted into the S.O.E. in 1943 and was soon
in France, a radio transmitter/receiver strapped to her body. She reported
almost daily to England on Nazi troop movements, etc., in spite of the
presence of the Gestapo.
She was captured by the Nazi when she was fighting
German troops 07-31-1944 with members of the French resistance and sent
to Ravensbrück concentration camp (primarily for women). Sometime
in January 1945, a very ill and mistreated Rolfe was executed with one
shot through the back of her head.
Event 04-26-1918: the right to vote and stand for political office
for women of the Canadian Province of Nova Scotia was validated. The general
enfranchisement of women in Canada occured 05-24-1918.
B.
04-26-1918, Fanny Blankers-Koen, amazing Dutch track star who won four
gold medals in the 1948 Olympic Games at age 30 - and would probably had
won seven that year if Olympic officials had not determined that WOMEN
could only compete in three singles events because too much physical exertion
was unhealthy for women.
Many argue that FBK is the most remarkable of all women
who have competed in track and field events.
Her career that started so brightly in the 1936 Olympics
wast off by World War II before it hardly began as the Germans invaded
the Netherlands and all international sports competition was cancelled.
Click
on image to see full-size version
During the German occupation of the the Netherlands
she married and had two children. She suffered badly from malnutrition
because of food shortages.
Had the war not intervened and had the Olympics committee
not been so sexist, it is possible that she could have won more than 14
gold medals in the various track events at the 1948 games. She excelled
in everything from the 100m dash to shot put and won the initial Penthalon.
Dubbed "The Flying Dutchwoman,"
she was harshly criticized in 1948 for not staying home and taking care
of her family. She was quoted in one magazine article as saying, "The
people didn't like it, especially the women. They wrote me that it was
a shame that a mother of two children was running in little short shorts
in a stadium. I always said that these women are jealous."
However, at the time of the 1948 Olympics the
shouts and newspapers articles were so vicious that she broke down in tears
and was going to leave. She detested the next race, the 200 m. Her husband
talked an exhausted FBK out of giving in and she won by seven yards.
Another magazine article describes how Blankers-Koen
and her family rode in an open coach drawn by four white horses in a parade
in her honor in Rotterdamn.
"All I've done is run fast,"
she said at the time. "I don't quite see why
people should make so much fuss about that." Yet as one reporter
wrote, "Holland has won four gold medals in
track and field history, and Fanny has been part of them all." Her
neighbors gave her a bicycle "so she won't have to run so much."
As it was, she set a total of 7 world records in 7
individual events. Her time of 11.0 seconds in the 100-yard dash in Amsterdam
in 1938 tied a world record.
By the time of the 1948 Olympics she was the world-record
holder in the 100, the hurdles, the high jump and the long jump.
B. 04-26-1922, Jeanne Sauvé - first woman Governor-General,
the 23rd of Canada.
After a long, distinguished career in journalism,
JS entered politics and was elected a member of Parliament (1972) on the
Liberal party ticket. Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau made her a
Cabinet member and she held successive portfolios of science and technology
1972-74, environment 1974-75, and communication 1975-1979.
In 1980 she was appointed the first woman speaker
of the House of Commons and served for four years. JS was named governor-general
in 1984 for a five-year term that ended in January 1990. She died on Jan.
26, 1993, in Montreal.
B. 04-26-1926, Harper Lee - U.S. writer who wrote only one novel,
but what a novel! It was To Kill A Mockingbird (1960).
B. 04-26-1926, Vera Nikoiaevna Maslennikova - Soviet war hero
and professor of mathematics.
Dr. Maslennikova received the Order of Patriotic War
for her actions in the defense of Moscow during World War II.
After earning her Ph.D., she taught at the Stkelov
Mathematical Institute until in 1975 she was named to the chair of differential
equations and functional analysis at the Patrice Lumumba University.
B. 04-26-1932, Jill Allibone - British preservationist of Victorian
buildings. Her two books on investigating and preserving are required reading
for students of the 19th century.
B. 04-26-1933, Carol Burnett - U.S. comedian, singer, actor,
one of the great entertainment marvels of our era.
She starred in her own comedy shows on TV 1967-1979.
She made a number of movies and TV dramas.
She is truly one of America's funniest ladies.
She was known for her spectacular "Tarzan"
yell was well as helping other actors. Her shows always drew top talent;
she was never afraid of the competition.
B. 04-26-1938, Lee Bennett Hopkins - U.S. children's author.
B. 04-26-1943, Prudence Leigh Acton - Australian fashion designer
and cosmetics executive of companies bearing her name.
B. 04-26-1944, Cathie Black - U.S. president, Hearst Magazines,
the world's largest publisher of monthly magazines.
No woman has ever wielded as much power in the publishing
industy as CB did.
She was the final word for such magzines as Cosmopolitan,
Good Housekeeping, Esquire, and Harper's Bazaar. The
Heart chain had a monthly readership of 126 million.
She started as advertising manager for Ms. Magaine
in 1972, then publisher of the weekly New Yorker magazine, and then
the first president and publisher USA Today newspaper.
B.
04-26-1947, Donna de Varona - U.S. swimmer, holder of 37 national swimming
titles and two Olympic gold medals. She set a number of world records.
Considered one of the finest exponents of the difficult
400-medley races that combined backstroke, butterfly, breaststroke, and
freestyle, the Olympics did not hold the event for the women, just the
men before 1964. She has been a battler for equal rights for women athletes.
Verona cofounded and served as president of the Women's
Sports Foundation,
Died 04-26-1998, Dominique Aury - French author.
DA is the author of the S&M classic The Story
of O (1954) that she wrote under the pen name of Pauline Rage.
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QUOTES DU JOUR
JANEWAY, ELIZABETH:
"Like their
personal lives, women's history is fragmented, interrupted; a shadow history
of human beings whose existence has been shaped by the efforts and the
demands of others."
--
Elizabeth Janeway in Women: Their Changing Roles.
LOOS, ANITA:
"So this gentleman
said a girl with brains ought to do something else with them besides think."
"I'm
furious about the Women's Liberationists. They keep getting up on soapboxes
and proclaiming that women are brighter than men. That's true, but it should
be kept very quiet or it ruins the whole racket."
-- Anita Loos
ALLISON, DOROTHY:
"Stupid or smart,
there wasn''t much choice about what was going to happen to me... Growing
up was like falling into a hole... I might not quit school, not while Mama
had any say in the matter, but what difference would that make? What was
I going to do in five years? Work in the textile mill? Join Mama at the
diner? It all looked bleak to me. No wonder people got crazy as they grew
up."
-- Dorothy Allison in her acclaimed autobiographical Bastard Out of
Carolina.
NASRIN,
TASLIMA:
"...The insistence
of fundamentalists on divine justification for human laws; second, the
insistence of fundamentalists upon the superior authority of faith, as
opposed to reason; third, the insistence of fundamentalists that the individual
does not count, that the individual is immaterial. Group loyalty over individual
rights and personal achievements is a peculiar feature of fundamentalism.
Fundamentalists believe in a particular way of life; they want to put everybody
in their particular straitjacket and dictate what an individual should
eat, what an individual should wear, how an individual should live everyday
life everything would be determined by the fundamentalist authority.
"Fundamentalists do not believe in individualism,
liberty of personal choice, or plurality of thought. Moreover, as they
are believers in a particular faith, they believe in propagating only their
own ideas (as autocrats generally do). They do not encourage or entertain
free debate, they deny others the right to express their own views freely,
and they cannot tolerate anything which they perceive as going against
their faith. They do not believe in an open society and, though they proclaim
themselves a moral force, their language is hatred and violence. As true
believers, they are out to "save the souls" of the people of
their country by force of arms if necessary."
"The fundamentalists
want to replace democracy with theocracy and to impose old theocratic laws
instead of modern secular laws on the members of their own society, not
on other distant powerful states which they consider their enemies."
"I believe in plurality
of culture, and I have nothing against Western culture as such. But in
the past, feelings of cultural superiority among the Western rulers were
a constant irritant to the people of non-Western countries. When fundamentalism
looms large, the West should be very careful in handling the culture of
Asian, African, and Latin American peoples. There is no such thing as a
"superior or inferior" culture, there are only various cultural
patterns which make up this beautiful, multicolored mosaic."
-- Dr. Taslima Nasrin, Bangladeshi feminist author who is under a death
sentence (fatwa) from the so-called holy men of her homeland. (TN's fatwa
is not discussed very much in the western media probably because she is
"only" a woman and perhaps because the Muslim forces have decreed
that they should not.
Instead the media glorifies Salman Rushdie who was
under the same kind of death threat (fatwa) for the one book that the fundamental
Muslims found blasphemous. Rushdie received British government protection
and apologized for any wrong he may have committed in his book.
TN fled to Sweden, received no taxpayer-paid protection
and she has REFUSED to apologize or step back from her statements in which
she says that the abuse and subjugation of women is not part of the Muslim
religion. (TN had stayed in her home inspite of the fatwa to nurse her
mother and didn't flee until after her mother died.)
RUSHDIE, SALMAN:
In a 2001 article published in Britain, Rushdie
tells women to beware of women, blaming women for the missing girls of
India. Rushdie says that it is the women who do not stand up to their husbands
and abort girl foetuses that are to blame for the growing one-sexed population
of his nation.
Salman Rushdie, like so many men in a patriarchal
society, refuses to see the obvious.
In India many wives who do not obey their husbands,
or the husbands want larger dowriess, suffer "kitchen
accidents" where they are burned to death
from kerosene spills. They are ostracized and locked up, or thrown out
into the streets, etc., if they do not bear sons.
Rushdie blames the victims, of course. In many cases
the sons' MOTHER is the one who commits the crime. She has a choice. Either
she dies or the daughter-in-law dies.
In his defense he describes the household where he
grew up, one filled with professional women who were his aunts and others.
He then uses this class of wealthy women to denigrate and condemn the poorer
women who are tied by necessity to "old India" traditions.
"While I was growing
up, the family's houses, in India and Pakistan, were full of the instructions,
quarrels, laughter and ambitions of these women, few of whom resemble the
stereotype of the demure, self-effacing Indian woman. These are opinionated,
voluble, smart, funny, arm-waving persons - lawyers, educators, radicals,
movers, shakers, matriarchs - and to be heard in their company you must
not only raise your voice but also have something interesting to say. If
you aren't worth listening to you will most certainly not be heard.
As a result, I feel, to this day, most at home in the
company of women. Among my close friends, the girls far outnumber the boys.
[GIRLS!!! Rushdie is of a mature age.]
"In my writing,
I have repeatedly sought to create female characters as rich and powerful
as those I have known."
He then points out "ultrasound
tests to determine the gender of unborn children are increasingly being
used all over India to identify, and then abort, obscene quantities of
healthy female foetuses."
While claiming to be pro-choice and pro-woman, Rusdie
makes this preposterous statement:
"What should be done
when a woman uses her power over her own body to discriminate against female
foetuses?"
He continues blaming
women for the abortions saying that it is women who favor the male although
he does admit vague "myriad pressures
of a man-centred society, including the expenses of the dowry system."
"Women beware women:
an old story, given a chilling new gynaecological twist," Rushdie
writes.
Rushdie says the lack of acceptance of birth control
or family planning to curb the population is blamed on "Sanjay
Gandhi's attempt to introduce birth control by diktat during the forced-vasectomy
excesses of the mid-70s." (Sanjay was
assassinated.)
The population problem that will soon make India more
populous than China with smaller lands and resources, Rushdie says.
"Will girls become
more valued than they are today, or will the masculinism of Indian society,
reinforced by the weight of numbers, simply create more and more macho
men, and increasingly downtrodden women? Not all problems are capable of
instant solution," Rushdie writes.
He then suggests stronger government controls including
bonuses for girl children and taxes for boy children among others methods
while suggesting nothing to alleviate the "old India" traditions
of female dowry that can bankrupt a family with any girls.
It is also the female dowry tradition that results
in so many "kitchen fires" where wives are "accidentally"
burned to death allowing a man to marry a second or third time for new
dowry monies from the parents of the new brides.
Rushdie's position is a typical macho male one in
which the man thinks he is being so, so reasonable by only seeing the surface
problems from the intellectual male viewpoint - never once attempting to
get inside a woman's skin in a land where women (other than the very wealthy)
have few human rights and fewer breeder rights.
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