Sometimes it is easier to grasp personal issues. We can see that we “might” have problems individually and ways of growing and are getting better. Whether it is emotionally, physically, spiritually, or mentally, most of us, if we are at all open, can see that we have “cutting edges” that can be expanded and deepened.
Yet, probably because we have created such self-centered societies, we often lose sight of the reality that we live in expanded circles of context, all of which influence our lives and all of which we can and do affect.
If we are a bit lazy, or frightened, or too self-effacing (like women have been trained to be), we often do not seek to understand these interlocking spheres of influence.
When I was a young feminist back in the 60’s, I clearly saw that many of the issues I was facing were not just because of my personality, being too pretty or not pretty enough, refusing to play male/female games, or being too smart, too curious, or too – almost anything. I could see that the sexism I was facing was societal and institutional.
That awareness, simultaneously, made my life a great deal simpler and much more complicated. Now, almost 50 years later, institutional sexism is more accepted. And, it is probably not any better understood.
In my first book, Women’s Reality – an Emerging Female System in a White Male Society, I delineated three major systems with which women had to cope – all the time. I called the dominant system, which all women and minorities had to learn and with which we/they had to survive, the White Male System (WMS).
That system has been designed and developed by white males (with all our support). In that system, the power and influence are held by white males. This system has held sway for a very long time and, through colonialism, has spread throughout the world. A very important belief in that system that it is (self-defined) reality. Anything that is not known and defined by that system simply does not exist. A great deal of “reality” has been defined out of existence by the WMS because that knowledge cannot be seen, measured and defined by the beliefs and techniques of the White Male System. This WMS has found its definition and meaning in Western science.
There is another system that has been developed as a companion to the White Male System because the WMS needs it to survive. I call this other system the Reactive Female System (RFS). This RFS system is an artificial system designed by the WMS to produce and define women in such a way that they will be supportive of the White Male System and literally essential to the survival of the WMS. It has been easy for women to learn (we are, after all, smart) and for many centuries women believed to know and let live out of that system (getting male validation and approval) was a survival issue.
Thanks to the hundreds and thousands of years of the raising of women’s consciousness, women began to realize that they could survive and thrive without male validation and approval. They began to see an Emerging Female System (EFS) coming into existence. Not only could women survive outside of the WMS/RFS, they had something to bring to the human species that was unique and important. It might just be necessary to save the human race and the planet. And, it had been ripening and dozing in at least half of the population for centuries.
Not only had this knowledge, awareness and wisdom latently and silently pulsating inside of the females of the species, it was shared with the wisdom of the native cultures of the planet.
We have reached a place in our development as a species and with our destructiveness as a species that this knowledge and wisdom is essential to save the human race and the planet. (See Women’s Reality for more about this information).