How the Patriarchy ruined Friday 13th for Women - what else have they stolen?

Happened to see this reviewed. Have no idea if it is any good, but it sort of fits in with the theme of women's lives being hidden.

This happened in medicine too. In the medieval world women had dominated medicine: they could train as doctors, serve apprenticeships in their specialities and then set up as physicians, surgeons, apothecaries and healers. Agnes Medica was working in Huntingdonshire in 1271, her name suggesting she was a doctor, surgeon or apothecary; Matilda le Leche, a “sage femme”, earned a living as a wise woman in Berkshire in 1232; Cecilia of Oxford was “surgeon” to Queen Philippa of Hainault, wife of Edward III, and paid about 12d a day. But in 1512 a law regulating physicians and surgeons was passed to prevent “sorcery” and “witchcraft” among medical practitioners, and was the start of a campaign to drive women out of the industry.

The College of Physicians, formed in 1518, claimed that any practitioner outside the college was not to be trusted — and women could neither join the college nor attend universities. The College of Physicians undertook 29 prosecutions of women between 1550 and 1600, and issued formal warnings and exclusions to anyone practising surgery or doctoring without one of its licences.

Prejudice against women practitioners meant that England was the last major country in the world to train women doctors. The first school for women physicians opened in London in 1874; there were 17 colleges open to American women around the same time. One of the heroines of the women’s campaign for medical training was Sophia Jex-Blake. Refused admission to study medicine at the University of Edinburgh in 1869 on the grounds that they could not make provision for a single lady, Jex-Blake advertised for other women: six joined her and studied for a medical degree despite verbal and physical abuse from male students. Arriving to sit an exam, they were blocked by a mob of 200 men.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/a-short-surprising-history-of-women-in-britain-by-philippa-gregory-mb5j9pvlg

Behind a paywall but can be read here https://archive.ph/NDbkk

Sorry meant to add to the post about the MSG.

The link to the article isn't to say this is a usual article as it was obviously influenced by the writer's own personal beliefs.

There is a web site dedicated to her work and poetry. http://www.asphodel-long.com/

Just adding a link to the other strand of 70s feminism, ie matriarchy.

There was a Matriarch Study Group which existed for some time and seemed strong and together. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/096673500401200206

And then guess what?

A trans woman joined the group and sortly after the group split into those who thought they should act as a support group for the trans woman, and those who wanted to continue their original purpose.

This was some decades ago, and although many were shocked, everybody thought, well this is a one off, not anything we need to worry about.

Silly us.

Introducing Red Rag by Ros Delmar
https://banmarchive.org.uk/red-rag/redrag-introduction/

OP you might be interested to read The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State by Friedrich Engels.

Thanks! I've read the easy read version ie without big words and jargon!

But it is interesting how some these men were much more aware of a different structure of the family etc.. I suspect that with the passage of time the current generation are totally cut off from it.

But on the other hand, some how Freud in the same century, totally evaded any notion of women as self governing.

(In the early days of Women's Liberation there were quite a few Marxist Feminist Groups - eg Red Rag - and also, strangely quite a few Freudian Feminist Groups. ie women's liberationists would meet up to talk about and re-examine writings and movement that had had an influence on society, and see if at all it fitted into an analysis that saw life through the eyes of women.)

However, the more general point that women's knowledge has been suppressed and mischaracterised as unimportant or sinister

Yes, and again from what i have read in the past, the persecution of witches was as much about women having formally had the information and knowledge of herbs etc., re healing, had to be turned from being the "wise woman" you turned to into the opposite. Someone who would harm you. And that men of "science" didn't want these "old wives tales" being taken more seriously than their newer "science".

But interestingly again, from only getting more recent articles from searching, more modern papers and articles just present it as outright misogeny, rather than a battle between the old ways and the new.

More than 2,500 Scots – most of them women – were executed under the Witchcraft Act of 1563
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/mar/08/nicola-sturgeon-issues-apology-for-historical-injustice-of-witch-hunts

And by just (or witch craft) there is going to be a talk about this at the British Library and online https://www.bl.uk/events/witch-hunt-a-history-of-persecution

This is a thread from earlier this year asking why Patriarchy https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4788786-why-has-it-always-been-a-patriarchy and I sort of assumed everyone on FWR would have read it!

I am mentioning it, because it is looking at the issue from another angle, ie was there ever a time when how women worked together as clans rather than families, and had influence and decision making powers, that meant life was lived differently. (And I dont mean not having electricity!)

And whether once men discovered their role in conception they adopted a concept of ownership and the start of families. Or whether because women were more tied to the home (child birth, breast feeding) and doing the farming! men were free to roam around, supposedly hunting (now disputed) and then started a pattern of confrontation with other responsibility free men roaming around. Or was it trade, concepts of ownership.

For anyone who is interested.

And I didn’t think Wicca is a particularly old tradition

I think, but probably didn't explain it properly, that when looking up references I was amazed how little older material, ie only about 15-20 years ago no longer seemed available via search engines.

So referencing Wicca was meant to be about how in regurgitating older traditions, a current generation would only have acess to modern interpretations of older traditions. (I think this has become more and more apparent on google etc.. You are spoon fed the most popular / recent rather than the most factual).

I don't think you hear so much about matriarchal feminism now because a lot of the historical claims weren't all that well founded

I think you have misunderstood or been misinformed.

Matriarchal Feminism wasn't about trying to re-enact some historical fable or another.

It was about attempting to create a life that focused on how women, given the opportunity, would organise and decided on priorities.

So even if some think it daft it would include taking note of mentrual cycles and so on. ie so much of how women are expected to live their lifes is about fitting into a pattern of life that was created to suit men, including the fact that they anticipated having a woman doing domestic chores, whether a mother, a wife or a daughter.

Current concepts of feminism are now so narrow and largely framed by the expectation that the way life is now, is the norm.

That's the female connection with Friday 13th - Freya and her twelve companions.

I've not heard that. I mean what seems to have a similar concept but in this instance from northern Europe.

if people had had bad things happen to them on Friday 13. As I have twice.

Oh no, but hope this is some light relief. I used to dread friday 13th when I was young. I really believed everything would go wrong and crept around.

But then I was also told, that on All Hallow's Eve (now commercial Halloween) that if you didn't walk backwards up the stairs (carrying your shoes?????) the dead spirits would get you. Whilst in other countries familes were going to relatives graves with candles and goodies to celebrate lives well lived.

I certainly experienced growing up tales of customs that all seemed to be gloom and bad luck, but just assumed it was because of a sort of dreary superficial protestantism.

I think maybe some of this was covered in an earlier thread about when (or even if) societies ceased to be agrarian based matrilineal societies, over thrown / undermined by hunting / ownership societies dominated by violent men.

Which is where many of the old stories about women having their power taken from them originated from.

But still am surprised so few seem to have even heard of this, given that at one time Matriarchal Feminism was quite a strong strand of Women's Liberation.