The Burning Times: fascinating docu on women's power before Christianity

Sorry, to clarify: I don't mean I think you were trying to be racist (!), I mean, that's why I objected to that phrase, because I associate it with a Eurocentric view that dismisses everywhere else as 'too far away to care about'.

Tyr, don't you think it is racist to say that somewhere far from you is therefore the 'ends of the earth'? What makes you the centre of attention?

I agree that all sorts of horrific things happen alongside (and perhaps interlinked with) the oppression of women: doesn't mean we should see it as a distant problem. It ought to concern us very nearly and certainly as nearly as things that happened in the European past.

LRD,

I am actually surprised that you would draw that from what I said. It is not what I meant at all.
There are parts of rural India where all manner of atrocities continue, including bonded child slavery. In that sense, as well as the geographical, it is the ends of the earth.

Tyr, it's offensive to call rural India 'the ends of the earth'. You may not mean to (indeed I hope you don't), but it comes across as if you are saying that the fact these women don't live near us means it's somehow ok for them to be treated like this.

But in some areas men were in the majority among the accused and executed.

This doesn't mean the image of the witch was gender-free, but it does mean that men could be enmeshed in it too. See Male Witches in Early Modern Europe, by Lara Apps and Andrew Gow, and Witchcraft and Masculinities in Early Modern Europe (Palgrave Historical Studies in Witchcraft and Magic).

Also in Salem and in England, witches were not burned but hanged. See Diane Purkiss, The Witch in History: Early Modern and Twentieth-century Representations, 1996.

Malleus Maleficarum was severely criticised by many inquisitors when it was first published. See the introduction to The Hammer of Witches: A Complete Translation of the Malleus Maleficarum by Christopher S. Mackay (Paperback - 28 May 200

The Spanish Inquisition only executed TWO women for witchcraft in its entire duration. See Women in the Inquisition: Spain and the New World by Mary E. Giles (Paperback - 28 Oct 199

There was never any ancient matriarchal religion; see The Myth of the Matriarchal Prehistory: Why an Invented Past Won't Give Women a Future by Cynthia Eller, 2001.

"If the witch trials were purely to do with capitalism they would have been equally targeted against men and women."

Really? Are you now advancing the propositon that men and women are equally oppressed under capitalism. Whew....

Dittany,

Your posts and opinions are hardly defined by their intellectual rigour, but you surpass yourself with that, whatever you are attempting to imply.

p.s. You can now start a rant on the sytematic oppression of momkeys by monkey hating men. Oops... there were women involved too, were there not?

Dittany....

You don't have to go far to see that this is still being done to women:

Actually,you have to go the ends of the earth, in this case rural India. It also occurs in Papua New Guinea and rural Africa (although they burn a lot of male witches there too so that probably wouldn't suit your agenda)
If you got off that soapbox, you'd realise that what is at stake (no pun intended) is superstition and ignorance, more than the mere "woman hatred" you are seeking to validate.
There are plenty of areas of history where you could point to the exclusion and oppression of women but this is far from a clear example.

The problem is what can realistically replace capitalism

no need to appologise LRD.
what a horrible story-yes superstition is terrifying isnt it.

Yeah, SAF, that does seem to be going on again. It strikes me as a desperate attempt to keep the old model working, rather than getting stuck into a new model more appropriate for our times.

I understand your interest in "How did we get here?" though I don't share it. It does have strong contemporary relevance, though, because those same scripts are still playing out in less-industrially-developed places. We should be able to learn from past mistakes, and convey our learning to others. This is why I'm so strongly in favour of targeting aid towards women, for example.

Oh, I'm sorry sparky - I didn't think to put a warning on it because of the context of this thread being rather more gruesome, but perhaps I should have done.

For anyone else, the link above is not a pleasant story.

Superstition is terrifying, isn't it?

omg-i wish i hadnt looked!

Blimey! There's a loooong way to go ...

Just seen this.

www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/31/mob-burns-monkey-as-witch