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

[sakura]

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ANd why women are feared to the extent that they are accused of witchcraft and killed for it

I haven't watched the film, my laptop is too rubbish. But I will try to do so at some point.

Glad you're not flouncing, Milly!

MillyR,

I had thought of using the German example but went for something closer to home.
It is true that the forging of a distinct identity need not lead to hatred and discrimination; however, it is an inherent danger in the forging and one that all of us need to be aware of on a personal level.
The example you give of Odinism is interesting (to me, for personal reasons) and I was alluding to that earlier when I referred to race hate groups picking bits of history (or mythology in this case) to suit their agenda.
I have come across them and, with the occasional wily exception, they tend to be dim and humourless. Unfortunately, they compensate for their lack of magical acumen by getting publicity and tarring everyone with the same brush

Er...actually, they took issue with the main dates cited in the film. I can't, quite honestly, see what the problem is with saying 'ah, yes, OK, let us re-address this issue with a bit of truth and accuracy in it'. We don't actually have to say 'ah but it has to be defended'. Which is why most people on this thread have moved on to discuss other stuff, with a tactful veil drawn over the crashing inaccuracies outlined by quite a few posters above.

'I'd want to discuss why men as a group are so set on inflicting extreme violence towards women.'

Why do you think that is, dittany? It certainly is unusual; I read once that most mammal species are incapable of successful rape, as the female has to be willing for sex to occur. Humans are an exception here.

Male mallards gang-rape female ones in a very unpleasant way... but other birds, e.g. swans, mate for life and mourn when their mate dies. Fascinating.

Well, it would be a completely different film. Not the same one remade with a few errata twiddled with.

"I'd want to discuss why men as a group are so set on inflicting extreme violence towards women. I don't think there is another male animal on earth that treats the female of its species the way men as a group treat women as a group. When you look at it from that point of view, it's extraordinary"

So you're not even limiting it to priests, lawyers, inquisitors or even just groups of men in power anymore; it's all of them in one homogenised mass.
Try removing the word "men" and substitute "jew," "black," "immigrant" and see how it reads.
But you're right; when you look at it from that point of view, it's extraordinary.

I've skimmed over the last 15 posts or so. I'm feeling stressed already, and don't need yet another bunfight just now.

I think the 'off topic' discussion is relevant to the matter of how & why women can be generically demonised.
We spoke about superstition, and surmised that the mysterious things (to a pre-scientific mind) a woman's body can do might look supernatural to men.
We discussed the fact that fear can provoke oppression.
We looked at women's internalisation of their own marginal status within communities - this is directly relevant to the witch trials, too, as so many 'witches' were denounced by other women.
That more women exercise 'out of the box' thinking, with a broader perspective than 'binary' intellect allows, is a massively feminist point. Not only because of the academic & professional ramifications, but because it's something that has always caused unease amongst male rule-setters.

Feminism needs philosophers because it is a philosophy. In trying to stifle philosophical engagement, Ditanny, you exert the very same binary thinking and dumbing influence you wish to free women from.

I can't help remembering, too, that you once lambasted me for trying to bring a thread I started back on topic. You said I was wrong to try and stifle the ongoing discussion. I felt you were right about that! So how about taking your own advice?

Oh come on: it's far more likely as we've all said that men (and women) would say 'oh, silly women with no grasp of history whatsoever, got the basic premise totally wrong'.

And yes, the thread moved on. It went in different ways. Which threads do. Or we could stay stuck in the 'actually it's got everything wrong' 'no, it hasn't and anyone who says it has is a simpering pawn of the patriarchy' and go round and round and round.

We did try and talk about the women this happened to. You wrote that off as people making it into a local event in order to deny the scale of the witch hunts.

I really can't think of any angle from which to talk about the witch hunts of which you would approve, unless I listed a range of sadistic tortures used. I am suspicious of the motives of people who want to get into depth about torture methods. I can't think of any reason why we need to discuss torture in any more detail than was covered in the film.

Then I would suggest it is a case of two different levels of power wanting the same thing at the same time.

At a local level, communities were lacking resources (due to plague etc). They could get more resources off people they considered expendable - women who were old or single. I think that was the case all over Europe, but was only supported by the authorities in areas where they felt they needed to impose more control. So in Spain, where they had already imposed an orthodoxy, when witch craze set in, rather than go out to burn witches, they imposed a ban on witch accusations.

In countries where the authorities felt their control was under threat, due to religious conflict, they supported and encouraged the accusation of witches, so they could be seen to be exerting power. So where Protestant religions were new, they held witch trials. Where Catholicism was under threat, they held witch trials.

I was also wondering how it fits in with all the people who were killed for being heretics. Was that mainly men or women? If people were going to accuse many women of being ignorant or too stupid to have a view, would it then undermine that claim if you killed them as a heretic? Do you have to acknowledge someone as having an intellect in order for them to be capable of heresy? In that case, it would be more sensible to accuse women of witchcraft instead, which doesn't imply any intellectual ability, and in fact can be seen as a challenge to people who are in authority due to being educated? But I don't know about that. I don't know how many men were murdered as heretics, or why.

So address the question.