Creative Misogyny
It struck me as funny, just how much Classen talks about how misogynistic the Church is during the Middle Ages. The way the Church said "if ... 'men could see beneath [women's skin]' then they would be safe from the temptations of touch, since 'how can we desire to embrace such a sack of dung'" (76) is hilarious. They get points from me for creativity, at least.
A centuries-long history of homophobia within the Catholic Church seems almost ironic amidst these claims of how horrible women are--a disclaimer here is that I am a lesbian and grew up Catholic, though I no longer am. I sort of jokingly thought while reading a good majority of Classen's 'A Woman's Touch' chapter, "If they hate women that badly, why didn't think they think being gay is okay?" You know, women are "sack[s] of dung" (76) on the inside, so... just stop encouraging heterosexual marriage. Of course, I'm not serious about that, it's just sort of funny to think about the hypocrisy. Men are meant to be "rational" and think with the mind, but honestly, it seems like men throughout history have been anything but (76). If "rational" is meant to mean 'not dependent on touch,' then none of us could ever be considered rational. We all need touch, in one way or another, in order to feel grounded, to feel like a person.
The Middle Ages revolved around forming homosocial culture, with men associating themselves with men and women with women. Swearing fealty involved a kiss, holding hands (handshake?), or really physical acts of touch in order to prove you meant it. It's really not only women who 'take advantage of touch' like the Church seems to imply with the whole 'temptress' thing. Kings know that touch forms a bond, it makes you vulnerable. Get someone that close to you, close enough to kiss you to swear fealty, and they're in your space. That's a show of power, an assertion of royal dominance, or really anything along those lines.
I find it silly that they associate touch with women as if it were something that is 'bad' when touch in the hands of men is intimidating. Women possessing any sort of power was scary back then, I suppose. Touch is so influential that this idea has still existed in one way or another for years down the road.
I feel like as much as we talk about it I will never understand the double standards and hypocrisy of sexism and homophobia, because they are ultimately irrational concepts fueled by the hunger for power over others.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you, Ellie! It's a weird hypocrisy that seems to scapegoat femininity, no matter what.
ReplyDeleteThe history of religious, and especially Christian, misogyny is fascinating. Obviously a lot of it was likely left over from other cultural beliefs and gender roles. You'd likely enjoy this, but there was a time that men in ancient Athens were so misogynistic that it was considered gross to have sex with a woman outside of procreation purposes and that sexual relations with men were purer relationships!
ReplyDeleteOverall, I think it has a lot to do with a fear of not knowing whether your children are your children, and so women were foremost assumed to be unfaithful so that harsh rules could be placed upon them in order to alleviate a lot of that fear. So, a lot of concepts of sin and morality got pushed upon women and boom, all the casual misogyny that was born from it. And then these thoughts just got continually reinforced until texts such as those began appearing.
I also think it's interesting (as both a lesbian and a history major) particularly because in the middle ages, there was no such thing as "gay people." That is, it wasn't possible to identify as "gay" (or straight or anything else), only to be a person who did gay things (which was looked down upon). It was fully about action (and therefore touch) and not internal identity and feelings
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