Stunned and Disgusted

Well, this is a new low. It seems to me and my spouse as though health care reform is being derailed AGAIN. Our government doesn't have the spine to stand up to a poisonous coalition of misled, hysterical screamers and cynical big-money corporations (insurance, pharmaceuticals, HMOs, you name it). Of course, our political system as it presently operates is with very few exceptions a cat-house where money talks and BS walks.

It's exhausting, frustrating and infuriating. Everyone with any common sense knows that if we don't have a public option, i.e. any real competition for the insurance companies, they will go on colluding, price-fixing and cherry-picking those they insure (that is, using "pre-existing conditions" to make sure they don't end up with seriously ill people on their rosters). The costs of care will keep skyrocketing and this country will continue to be the Dickensian mess it presently is, inspiring mockery and pity in the more civilized world, where citizens have a right not to be bankrupted simply by getting sick.

I've been sending lots of snail-mail and e-mail to politicians I supported financially in the past, chastising the Blue-Dog Democrats (read: Republicans, and not even Republicans-lite) and trying to put some spine in the supposedly real Democrats, but of course my checkbook isn't as fat as the health care industries'. No-one seems to be listening, no-one has any balls, no-one is standing up for justice and to put an end to the outrageous, appalling non-system presently tormenting this country. I'm so fed up, so red-hot angry, I'd think it a relief to run amok.

If I have to stand by and watch the Obama administration, which I worked hard to get into office, pretend we're getting "health care reform" while basically leaving things just as they were, I will vomit, and I will make a point of vomiting on someone who shares responsibility for this terrible failure.

I've learned a dreadful thing: that this country is so bought and sold, so totally owned by the big corporations, that there probably is no hope for justice or even plain old common sense to prevail. And putting all my energy into a third party, as I've done in the past, will do no good at all if the entire election system continues to revolve around nothing but the no longer so almighty dollar.

I'm over fifty years old and look at this mess. Women still don't have a firm guarantee of the same civil rights as men (no Equal Rights Amendment). We have to go on forever fighting the tacitly tolerated domestic terrorists (the anti-choicers) to preserve a shadow of abortion rights, trying to make sure that the lives of girls and women aren't derailed because of unplanned pregnancies. If biology can be used to keep women down, it doesn't seem to matter that unwanted children are a recipe for long-term social disaster.

Speaking of social disasters, homophobia and racism still run rampant. This country is so desperately immature and willfully unthinking that many of its denizens remain obsessed with trying to make every couple look like Ken and Barbie, instead of realizing that full legal protection for stable unions, same-sex or opposite-sex, is good for everyone. And let's not even get into the fact that arduous legal struggles were necessary to so much as allow veterans' graves to be marked with the symbol of their Pagan beliefs. Ironically, for us straight white folks, the way to instantly and viscerally find out what discrimination is all about is to be up front about not being Christian. Of course, being a woman, I did already have some idea of what it's like to be considered automatically inferior. But I'm the first to admit that the flak I've faced, though real, doesn't measure up to what people of color or lesbians and gays have to endure.

Well, I'm sure I won't feel this desperate forever, but right now the idea of spending the rest of my days overwhelmed by the stupid, the bigoted, the corrupt and the venal is bloody unattractive, and the feeling of disillusionment about this president and government is bitter indeed, though part of me always expected it. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer, and the corporations continue to find ways to divide and conquer and manipulate the comparatively poor to get out there and make their own situation constantly worse by indulging their knee-jerk prejudices rather than being aware of what would really serve their interests.

Ugh.

An Introduction to (Neo-)Paganism

Here's a brief piece I wrote for a panel discussion at a college reunion, almost ten years ago:

Starting in 1991, I came back to the belief system I think I was born with. It's called Goddess spirituality, eco-spirituality, eco-feminism -- the big, catch-all term is Neo-Paganism. None of these names fit completely, and some of the words are given a negative spin by popular culture.

It's partly rooted in ever-growing amounts of archaeological evidence of non-patriarchal pre-Christian cultures in Africa, Asia, and Europe. These societies, which existed for hundreds, sometimes thousands of years, were egalitarian, co-operative, highly creative and largely peaceful. They saw the spark of the divine in everything living, and when they personified this divine essence, they called it Goddess -- later, they also called it God.

For me, it's also a personal re-connection to remembered moments in my childhood, experiences of wonder, times when I felt good about myself and the whole world, energized, 100 per cent alive.

But it's not all “going back.” My belief system rejects dualism, the idea that something must be either "this" or "that" -- so it can reach back and look forward at the same time. Neo-Paganism makes no claim to being some "authentic" revival of specific beliefs from 3,500 or more years ago. After all, it's Neo-Paganism, and it's about living in this, present world. It's about remaining aware of both the wider world, and the specific places we each live in: their seasons, climate, and geography, and the needs of that particular community. Because we insist on honoring where we are, what we come from and what we've become a part of, Neo-Pagans come in at least as many flavors as Baskin-Robbins Ice Cream -- but we DO share some basic principles.

First, to Neo-Pagans, the divine is immanent, NOT transcendent. It's not somewhere "above" us humans and the rest of the world, or "out there" -- it IS, and it IS in EVERYTHING, including us. All creation is born of a Great Mother and is part of Her substance, so everything is connected.

Second, Neo-Pagans accept no cast-in-stone hierarchies, and no all-powerful gurus. It's a woman-positive belief system -- for example, since we believe in Goddess, we can't well question women's right to be priestesses -- but it's not a belief system for women only. For men and women, Neo-Paganism gives the opportunity to explore and integrate all aspects of one's personality, to "think outside the box." We're also called to live in the body -- live juicy and messy, without denying the body and the emotions, without seeing the mind and spirit as separate from the body, superior or somehow more "pure." I believe I get one life, one wonderful gift, one chance to experience this beautiful world, through the medium of my body -- and I am grateful to my body, and love it.

At the same time, Neo-Paganism is a very demanding belief system. It's not about unlimited license or moral relativism. The one binding rule, the Wiccan Rede, could be called "How to be Stricter than the Ten Commandments in Eight Words or Less." It says, "IF you harm NONE, do as you will." Think about it. I am to harm nothing -- not myself, or anyone or anything else. So I'm required to "live lightly on the earth", to be constantly aware of the obvious and not so obvious impact of my actions. I have to take responsibility for everything I do, and examine and recognize the amazing power of my intentions and my expectations.

You can see why this is unlikely to become a majority religion! It's a lifelong learning process, without any promise of a future repeat performance. But it suits me, and quite a few others: there are now [1999] at least 200,000 Neo-Pagans in the United States alone.