Women's Activism
Like most areas of community activism,
women are the backbone of the peace movement in the west today.
Despite the disadvantages for political
activism of women having given the major responsibility for
children and families, some women have found ways to campaign,
even under the most hostile circumstances - often abused and derided
in doing so.
Historically women have been deprived
of education and been deliberately excluded from the professions,
public debate, politics, administration and decision making -
supposedly intellectually inferior to men and good only for domestic
tasks, careing, catering and entertaining me, to whom they were
expected to be subservient and dependent. As many if not most still
are.
Had women been able to take a full part
in world affairs, we would certainly not have the macho world we have
today.
The
male elites of politics, government, military and church have a lot to
answer for.
Church
and state are a marriage made in heaven,
Women freethinkers
who campaigned for women's equality, the abolition of slavery,
protection of minorites, secularism and anti-clericalism are featured
in:- Women Without Superstition
"No Gods No Masters"
Leaflet - Women,
Religion and Peace
"The roots of
sexism, racism, anti-Semitism, homophobia, fascism, and violence are
from the same seeds and thrive together in the same soil - superstitious
prejudices."