Anger and Grace

OK, I warned you that sidetracked-ness from the pet series could happen. Rachel Held Evans just posted about the conundrum of being a privileged person who is trying to learn to be more aware and sensitive and how to, either accidentally or on purpose, not use their privilege as a weapon against others.

And I had this lovely draft with some of my thoughts on that very subject just sitting there mostly ready to go.

These days, I find myself getting angry much more easily than I used to. Probably something to do with reading a lot more feminist media criticism and feminist perspectives of Christianity.

Feminism, it turns out, is one of those things where the more informed you are, the more you see how screwed up everything is. Figures.

So when people I love make comments about Halloween that propagate rape culture, or Steven Moffat writes another female character that has exactly the same personality, or rather lack thereof, as all his other female characters, or certain politicians imply that rape is part of God’s plan, or people from my denomination refuse to understand why purely masculine language about God is a problem, I get angry. I yell at my computer, wave my arms, say words and make gestures I wouldn’t if my parents were in the vicinity, rant to my husband with varying degrees of coherency. Some of my feminist friends and I discuss it over wine. Sometimes I journal or blog about it.

And of course it isn’t just anger; there is also pain: my pain, the pain of my friends and family. I hurt on behalf of us, and if I’m feeling generous I even hurt on behalf of those who said or did the hurtful thing, because they often don’t understand what it is they do. I don’t know whether it’s more of a good thing or a bad thing, but part of the human condition, at least as I experience it, is that pain and anger go hand in hand. It’s like they’re friends where Pain is the sensitive one and Anger is the protective and rather volatile one who will punch you in the face if you mess with Pain.

Anger is important. It signals that something is WRONG, and insists that something be done about it NOW. Anger channeled constructively can be the impetus for positive change to self and surroundings.

Unfortunately, as a Christian woman, I have to fight against two deeply ingrained social constructs just to have the right to unabashedly declare to the world, “Hey! I’m angry right now!” and still be taken seriously.

American culture at large is not kind to angry women. We tend to get branded as “shrill,” asked if maybe we are PMSing, as if emotion that comes to the surface during that time is less legitimate than emotions at other times. People will assume anything and everything about a woman’s anger other than the clearly ridiculous notion that something has happened at which the woman has a right to be upset. Because all women all the time are excessively emotional and take things too personally and the solution is to pat them on the head and give them chocolate and wine and chick flicks and send them on their irrational little way.

Then there is the particular Christian culture that I come from, evangelical Friends/Quakers. We’re not supposed to be angry either. Because we are into peace and silence and the movement of the Holy Spirit and Christ within, and they are all about love and grace and peace, and what does anger have to do with those things? It’s not like Jesus ever got angry or anything. Sheesh.

Honestly, I have a harder time with the second issue than the first, because there’s a lot of truth in the whole love and grace and peace not having a lot of room for anger, at least as we usually deal with it. Because remember when I said that anger channeled constructively could be the impetus for positive change? Well, I meant that, but if there’s one thing I know about the average human being, it’s that channeling natural but negative emotions constructively is not something we’re very good at. To put it mildly.

And then it gets even more complicated, because ingrained power structures often come into play. For example, our society is still saturated with male privilege, so there’s a lot of pressure on a woman who is angry at a man to find ways to just deal with it, or to be loving and gracious if it happens within Christianity. Christian men are allowed to be way more angry than Christian women about pretty much anything, but especially if a woman is angry at a man.

Now, as a woman who is also straight and white, I myself have a lot of privilege that I am doing my best to recognize. So when it comes to major power structures within society, I realize that I am part of the advantaged group, the group that is inclined to minimize and dismiss the anger of others, in the areas of both race and sexuality. I am sure I personally have been guilty of it in the past, and may well be again. All I can say is that I am sorry, and that I welcome being called out on it if it happens here on the blog.

Yet this is where it gets complicated, because though I understand the impulse, I don’t want to be yelled at. I have the best intentions, but I’m human, and my experience of the world is mostly limited to the smallish community in which I have spent all but a few months of my life. I want people who I may hurt to be free to say that they are angry, but to extend grace and the benefit of the doubt to me when they do so.

And if that is the treatment I want, doesn’t that mean it’s the treatment I ought to give others? Even politicians whose ignorance of  the female bodies they wish to legislate is nauseating and astonishing? Even pastors whose constant refrain is that women belong in the home under the authority of their husbands, that everything is about sex, that the only demographic that should really matter to the church is young men? Even to a person in my life who can be counted on to make at least one ignorant, sexist comment and be oblivious to the needs of those around him nearly every time I see him, and who I can’t avoid seeing while still being a decent human being myself?

How do I convince myself that these and others who anger me really do mean well, even if I think they are almost entirely misguided? How do I both show that I am willing to listen to their side, but that what has been said and done has hurt and angered both myself and others, and that we have as much right to our feelings and opinions as they do to theirs?

How do I find the courage to keep learning and engaging and getting uncomfortable and growing more aware and compassionate in my interactions with the wide world when that means facing the anger of people of color and sexual minorities?

What is the proper balance of anger and grace?

I wish to God I knew.

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Fed but not counted

“Then Jesus called his disciples to him . . . The disciples said to him, ‘Where are we to get enough bread in the desert to feed so great a crowd? . . . Those who had eaten were four thousand men, besides women and children.” (Matthew 15:32-33, 38 NRSV)

Tonight, at my church’s very simple evening service, we gathered in the round at the front of the sanctuary, many sitting on cushions or beanbag chairs rather than pews. We did a sort of group lectio divina of the story of the feeding of the four thousand from Matthew.

I hate that that is the name of the story.

Want to know why? Check verse 38, that last sentence of the quote at the beginning of this post.

Four thousand MEN, and who freaking knows how many women and children. The women and children may have outnumbered the men. We don’t know, we just know they were there, but somewhere along the way someone decided they weren’t worth counting.

At one point during the service, I felt prompted to share some of my dissatisfaction on this front, and received some encouraging comments afterwards.

Which made me think that this was a good topic for a post, especially since I’ve had some further thoughts. Like, for example, that in many ways the difference between the way Jesus treats the women and the way the story treats them is symbolic of a similar disconnect in much of the church.

Allow me to elaborate. Everyone was fed. Jesus gave thanks for the seven loaves and few small fishes, broke them, and gave them to the disciples who gave them to the crowd. A crowd of men, women, and children. Jesus fed them all, through his disciples.

And I’m no biblical scholar, but this story just says “disciples,” so isn’t it a possibility that this is not just the Twelve, but perhaps also some of the women disciples? Can’t you just imagine some of the women who supported Jesus’ ministry financially asking Jesus where they were going to get food for all those people, and really hoping that he’s not expecting them to come up with a solution because that kind of money they simply do not have?

But back to the main point: Jesus, with the help of some disciples, fed everyone. In no particular order. Regardless of gender, age, or class. Jesus fed everyone. “And all of them ate and were filled; and they took up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full” (verse 37).

Yet somewhere in the course of this story being told and eventually written down, it was decided that the number that mattered was 4000. 4000 men. Again, not a biblical scholar, but it seems to me to be unlikely that anyone who was there was able to do a head count, so this is at best a ballpark number from the get-go. Did the original tellers, presumably people who were there, speak only of the number of men, or did they try to count everyone? I doubt there’s any way to know. Either way, the story is now “the feeding of the four thousand,” never mind that that number includes only the men.

The women (and children) may have been fed by Jesus, but they are not counted by those who passed on the Gospel.

In how many churches today is this all too true? In how many churches do women encounter Jesus, worship and serve and build community, and yet are deemed unfit for leadership, are told by male representatives of the Gospel that when it comes to the people through whom God speaks, they do not count?

We are fed by Jesus. How long before we are counted by His followers?

 

 

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Boys and Insults

Scene 1

Several months ago, two elementary-school-aged boys whom I sometimes babysit were describing a book series they like, one with which I was not familiar. They were talking about their favorite characters from the series, and which they would like to be if they could.

“So-and-so is really cool because they have such-and-such powers,” said the older of the boys. “But she’s a girl,” he added.

When I asked why that should make a difference about her being his favorite or him wanting to be like her, all he could come up with was that it was because she was a girl and he was a boy.

Scene 2

I was helping with childcare at my church’s evening service on Sunday. There were at least 10 small children in the room, so a lot of chaos. Yet in the midst of it all, I noticed one of the boys attempting to aggravate his brother in a very specific way.

“Hey, you’re Hermione!” he yelled tauntingly across the room.

“Um, why is that an insult? Hermione is awesome,” I pointed out.

“She’s a girl.”

“So? Why is it insulting to be like a really cool girl?”

“It’s just something that we say.”

. . .

I wish that this is the part where I throw my hands up in the air and lament that I don’t understand where this attitude comes from, that I don’t know why boys think that comparing one another to girls is an insult.

But I know exactly where it comes from.

It comes from The Sandlot, where “You play ball like a GIRL!” is the insult to end all insults.

It comes from The Horse and His Boy, where Prince Corin expresses his admiration for Queen Lucy by saying that she is “almost as good as a man.”

It comes from the assumption that books and movies with male protagonists will be appealing to both boys and girls, but that those with female protagonists are just for girls.

And all of this comes from the time-honored Western tradition of holding the male up as the human perfection towards which we should all aspire, as opposed to females, who are inherently defective in some way.

Of course, few people can get away with just coming out and saying that women and girls are defective human beings just because of their gender, but every time a little boy learns that the best way to insult his brother is to feminize him, that is what is being expressed.

Look at it this way: if a girl watched Disney’s Tangled and decided that she liked Flynn Ryder better than Rapunzel, and said that if she could be one of the characters she would rather be him, I don’t think that would give many people pause. But what if a boy said he would rather be Rapunzel? I know that I at least have this weird gut-level reaction indicating that that is somehow very strange, despite the fact that I think boys should be just as free to like and identify with princesses as girls are to like and identify with heroes and warriors. (Not that there isn’t a problematic expectation that girls will prefer the princesses, just that I’ve noticed that in these instances girls are given more leeway than boys.)

It’s a sobering reality, but I think there is hope. The boys from my first anecdote love the Little House books and Avatar the Last Airbender, the both of which have female protagonists. Plus, the latter includes a character arc where a male character thinks that girls are inferior and then learns how very wrong he was. The boys from my second anecdote have a little sister who is showing signs of being one helluva girl (and with brothers like these, she’ll have to be to survive), and I suspect that could go a long way towards changing their minds.

And these are smart kids. Maybe if enough adults take thirty seconds to question them when they use girl as an insult, even if each instance is fleeting, those moments will accumulate into a realization that what they are saying just doesn’t make sense.

At which point they can go back to using creative descriptions of bodily functions to take each other down a peg. Because surely it is a far worse thing to be a “Pumpkin pooper!” than a girl.

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Guess what!

Recently, this Firefly/Serenity appreciation post showed up on my Tumblr dash. One of these days I am going to have to do an effusive, long-winded Joss Whedon appreciation post; today, however, is not that day because it is 9:45 p.m. and I have to get up early for work tomorrow. Instead, I want to take the opportunity to echo and affirm the sentiment expressed in the comments on the gifset:

THERE IS NO WRONG WAY TO BE A GIRL.

(Or a woman. For an excellent critique of our culture’s tendency to call grown women girls, something of which I am far too often guilty, go here.)

There is also no wrong way to be a boy or a man. People should just be allowed to be, you know, people. I’m not saying we should rule out the notion that there is some sort of fundamental deep-down difference between men and women, but I am definitely saying that we should be very, VERY hesitant in claiming an ability to actually know what that difference is.

I should clarify that, when I say there is no wrong way to be a woman or a man, I do mean within the bounds of acceptable human behavior. So rape and murder and infidelity (to name just a few universally-accepted no-nos) are not OK for women or men. Just so we’re clear. Though with that last one, the men really ought to get into just as much trouble as the women. Especially if he’s married and has kids and she’s not married and is much younger. I congratulate you on avoiding all forms of celebrity gossip if you don’t know what I’m talking about, and if you do, here is a little something proving that there are indeed other people who think the way the media has handled the whole thing is outrageous.

And please don’t start metaphorically hitting me over the head with the bible. Because seriously, with the possible exception of Greek mythology, the people held up as heroes in the bible are some of the biggest screw-ups known to humanity, and most of their life choices are not ones we should be emulating. Like, good for David for being the man after God’s own heart, but that doesn’t mean that all men are supposed to have heaps of wives and concubines and then still feel the need to commit adultery and murder. Also he must have been a terrible father, because his kids were even more messed up than he was. And it’s super great that Tamar was able to think and act on her own behalf, but we’re all on the same page with the fact that she did it by pretending to be a prostitute and then seducing her father-in-law, right? And that just because she’s the hero of the story doesn’t mean her specific behavior is meant to be a good example for all women for all time? Am I making myself clear?

So, to recap: there is no right or wrong way to be a woman or a man. God knows, being human is hard enough.

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