A while ago I was listening a history podcast that referenced something called the Four Pillars of Womanhood that I hadn’t heard of before. I did a little digging to find out more. Apparently, from 1820-1860, the role of women was viewed as encompassed by these four pillars. Women who did not possess these qualities were vilified as unnatural and undesirable mates. Given how closely they track with some current views of women in the Church, I was intrigued and simultaneously horrified. Let’s take a closer look at these Four Pillars and see if they are a relic of the past or if they are still seen as relevant in today’s Church.
Historian Barbara Welter explains that these pillars arose to define a role for women that complemented the masculine role that emerged as a result of the rise of industrial capitalism which took men away from the homestead, out of the agricultural life, and into the cities where long hours became the norm. These shifts saw the emergence of a new middle class in which husbands worked as lawyers, office workers, factory managers, merchants, teachers, physicians, etc. Increasingly, these middle class families began to see themselves as the backbone of society.
Women were encouraged to focus on these four “virtues” in response to these new social trends:
- Piety
- Purity
- Submissiveness
- Domesticity
Piety
Let’s start with the role of religion which was seen as a particularly important pursuit for women (as opposed to men). Religion had a few benefits for women who were left to handle domestic affairs while men’s jobs took them away from the home. It gave women a non-threatening place to exercise their social skills, one that wouldn’t encourage them to question the status quo or to develop their own ideas. It would also encourage women to exert a moral influence over the household, particularly the children and other members of the household. Religion and piety would reduce strife and selfishness when women were without the support and resources their husbands used to provide when they were more present.
“Religion is exactly what a woman needs, for it gives her that dignity that best suits her dependence.” Caleb Atwater, Esq.
“Religion is just what a woman needs. Without it she is ever restless and unhappy…” Mrs. John Sanford
Karl Marx observed that religion was the opiate of the masses. It was a particularly effective tranquilizer for women who wanted to see their activities as social and meaningful, but whose access to social power structures was being curtailed at this time. Participating in government or other civic areas was seen as a pathway out of the domestic sphere, something to be feared as it would leave vacant the spaces men had already vacated. Women were particularly cautioned against academic pursuits that would fill their heads with thoughts rather than prayer:
“the greater the intellectual force, the greater and more fatal the errors into which women fall who wander from the Rock of Salvation…” Sarah Joseph Hale
Purity
When the cat’s away, the mice will play. And when the husband’s off working, the postman rings twice. There’s nothing quite so unsettling to these “modern” men as the insecurity of paternity.
Women’s magazines warned that women who were unfaithful to their husbands or had “loose morals” would suffer madness or even death as a result. While “true” women were urged to protect their virtue, men were deemed more sensual, and women were cautioned that men would be unable to keep themselves from attempting to assault the virtue of women. It became the responsibility of women (despite their smaller physical size) to prevent men from fulfilling their carnal lusts or suffer the consequences. If a woman failed to rebuff a man’s sexual overtures, she could expect the worst possible outcomes:
“You will be left in silent sadness to bewail your credulity, imbecility, duplicity, and premature prostitution.” Thomas Branagan in The Excellency of the Female Character Vindicated
If she was successful in rejecting male seduction, however, she would be revered and respected by her potential assaulter as the preserver of virtue. Obviously, I can’t tell you how many Thank You cards I received in high school for all the advances I rebuffed! While men were in charge of most things, women were in charge of keeping their husbands’ carnal desires under control.
“The man bears rule over his wife’s person and conduct. She bears rule over his inclinations: he governs by law; she by persuasion…The empire of women is the empire of softness, her commands are caresses, her menaces are tears.” A popular women’s magazine of the period. I threw up a little in my mouth.
Real women were seen to have no sex drive. If a woman was passionate or pursued sex, it was believed she would drain her male partners of his life force like a vampire! So a woman who was asexual was seen as a sort of ideal. Still, the world must be peopled, which brings us to the next so-called virtue.
Submission
Since women were taught to fear sex and flee from it or risk mental illness, death, prostitution, and ignominy, the dilemma was that their only haven was to be marriage in which sex was an expected part. Whereas she must fight off the advances of any non-spouse, she was required to submit to the advances of her husband regardless her feelings. This extended beyond sex to all other aspects of her life because women were completely dependent on their husbands, barred from any means of self-support.
“True feminine genius is ever timid, doubtful, and clingingly dependent; a perpetual childhood…” Grace Greenwood
Female submission was required to the greatest extremes.
“if [your husband] is abusive, never retort.” Grace Greenwood
“to suffer and be silent under suffering seems to be the great command a woman has to obey…” from A Young Women’s Guide to the Harmonious Development of a Christian Character
By absorbing any negative emotions her husband threw her way, the woman was supposed to create a haven for the other family members. Her soft answer would theoretically turn away his wrath. And if that didn’t work, with no divorce available and provided he didn’t actually kill her first, there was always arsenic.
Women were constantly reminded that they were different from and inferior to men, and this kept them from questioning their position’s limitations too much.
“She feels herself weak and timid. She needs a protector. She is in a measure dependent. She asks for wisdom, constancy, firmness, perseveredness, and she is willing to repay it all by the surrender of the full treasure of her affection. Women despise in men everything like themselves except a tender heart. It is enough that she is effeminate and weak; she does not want another like herself.” George Burnap in The Sphere and Duties of Woman. Jeez, I wouldn’t want to be with someone like that either!
Lest this sound hopelessly outdated, I literally just saw a meme last week that said men were losing their way without a societal expectation that women need their protection! I mean, don’t these guys have jobs? Family obligations other than killing spiders and warding off home invasions? Doesn’t cleaning out the garage give them a reason to get up in the morning? Helping with the laundry or dishes? Being a parent? Fighting for social justice? Reducing their carbon footprint? Contributing to charity or the space program? Feeding the family dog?
And this next one makes women sound like faithful pets:
“A woman has a head almost too small for intellect but just big enough for love.” Aw, thanks. This was a popular saying of the time.
A belief in the inferiority of women was largely based on a few biological factors: 1) that women were on average physically smaller, 2) that women fainted more often (hello, corsets!), 3) that women menstruated which was believed to weaken them like a wound would, 4) that women appeared more emotionally unstable due to reproductive system differences. So tied to reproduction was the perception of women that one doctor argued that “It was as if the Almighty, in creating the female sex, had taken the uterus and built up a woman around it.” That’s a doctor, y’all. I wouldn’t want him examining me is all I’m saying.
Domesticity
The role of woman could best be summed up in the idea of a “woman’s place” being in the home. This is where all her important work was to be done, including: handling the sickroom (a constant need in the mid-1800s), overseeing the religious devotion of the household (including her husband), and overseeing the beautification and usefulness of herself and her home. Even though men were considered to be morally superior (and in all other ways superior) to women, women were responsible for keeping their husbands tethered to the Church and its teachings, since they might become distracted while they were off working long hours.
“Even if we cannot reform the world in a moment, we can begin the work by reforming ourselves and our households – it is woman’s mission. Let her not look away from her own little family circle for the means of producing moral and social reforms, but begin at home…” from The Young Ladies Class Book
Nursing others to health helped women to develop gentleness, patience and mercy. The repetitious domestic tasks of cleaning, making beds, and cooking meals, were supposed to create more patience and quiet reflection for women, to help them become more quiet, wise, and calm. These were seen as morally uplifting tasks, particularly by the people not doing them.
Women were particularly cautioned against reading too many novels because with their gentle natures and time for reflection, they were particularly susceptible to the influence of others. This was deemed particularly dangerous if those readings cast any doubt on the domestic role that had been staked out for women. Even women’s seminaries and finishing schools were defensive in claiming that they would not encourage women to leave the domestic sphere.
Women who sought achievements outside the domestic sphere were condemned in the harshest terms in women’s magazines of the day.
“They are only semi-women, mental hermaphrodites.” Reverend Harrington
To discourage women from seeking additional rights like the vote, this little ditty was penned:
The right to love whom others scorn
The right to comfort and to mourn.
The right to shed new joy on earth.
The right to feel the soul’s high worth.
Such women’s rights, and God will bless
And crown their champions with success…
Looking at each pillar compared to today, here’s what struck me:
Piety is a requirement for women in the Church still, and to some extent there is still a double standard about the role of women in keeping the family religious. While men are supposedly “presiding,” if the children fall away, the blame is still disproportionately assigned to mothers, particularly by older generations. In traditional homes, women are often expected to shoulder the load at keeping the family in the Church and the Church in the family. Women are also set up to be seen as lacking in piety if they leave the domestic sphere as in this so-called “study” published in 1998 at BYU. The free labor provided by non-working women correlates strongly (in the study) with religious devotion. This is not surprising given the stigma applied to working women, and yet no similar study was done to question the religious devotion of working men.
Purity is required of both men and women in the Church, and (polygamy aside, gag) is no different for men and women. However, some traditional attitudes still pervade, assuming that women endure sex while men pursue it. The Miracle of Forgiveness assigned blame to victims of sexual assault if they didn’t fight to the death rather than be assaulted, but these ideas are finally falling away.
Submissiveness has persisted in the temple language until the most recent changes. Clearly there’s some progress, if delayed substantially. While the proclamation claims men preside, it also claims husbands and wives operate as equal partners and does not delineate a submissive position for women. Hopefully these harmful attitudes are finally dying off.
Domesticity persists in the Church, and change comes slowly while many women still choose to stay home rather than pursue a career. The amount of work required in the home has steadily decreased over the last two centuries, so the continued focus on women remaining home rather than pursuing careers can leak out into more involvement in the local community than was thought proper in the 1820s, particularly in things like children’s extracurricular programs, volunteering or fund-raising for the school, and PTA groups. Women in the Church are certainly on the whole more prone to choosing to avoid career development, although this trend is changing along with the economy and as workplaces become more female-friendly.
So, have we come a long way, baby, or are these pillars still the norm for women in the Church? What do you think? It seems to me that while we have dropped some of these extreme views, the roots of our current views of women are clearly in this soil, and it holds us back from seeing women as full people in our own rights, just like men. That’s hardly surprising in a gerontocracy; they are living closer to the 1860s than the rest of us. But we are getting there, little by little.
What I find frustrating is that these restricted roles for women and outdated definitions for the family are not rooted in the teachings of Jesus and are not a prerequisite for living the gospel. If we instead focused our teachings on every individual living more like Christ, we would have far better outcomes than through this complementarian gender-role focus.
- Have you heard of these four pillars before?
- Do you think these extreme views of women are still pervasive in the Church? Why or why not?
Discuss.
Have you heard of these four pillars before? yes
Do you think these extreme views of women are still pervasive in the Church? no, common perhaps, but not pervasive
Why or why not? Because I am acquainted with 3 living generations of Church members – male and female – who do not hold those views and because of some years of examples of strong-willed, capable women committed to both the Church and their professional careers, at least some of them while raising children as well.
Incidentally, I’m not sure how pervasive those views were in earlier periods. I’m certainly no historian, but the strength of the early suffragette movement in Utah, the encouragement of at least some Mormon women to study medicine and become doctors, etc., suggest that there was at least considerable variation in views in that period. That variation seemed to disappear for 2 or 3 decades after WWII under the guidance of some Church leaders and the influence of Andelin’s “Fascinating Womanhood” (yuck!), etc. But such variation began to be obvious again to me by the early 70s.
Review the bios of newly called mission presidents and their wives (who are now called mission leaders, companions, etc., anything but co-presidents).
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/church/news/first-presidency-calls-new-mission-presidents-gallery?lang=eng#ahlander
The men ‘s ages, professions and church leadership positions are detailed. Women are ageless with no career experience or education listed, only church service. Where you would expect to see the woman’s age, you see the number of children the couple have. A few years ago I emailed a church news editor asking if they could include information about the wives’ education or career experience since it seemed to be a standard element for the husbands. I was told that the editor had been asking for permission to do that for a while, but was never given the info. The church collects the information from the women, they just won’t report it. For a short time after that they left out the career info for the husbands (instead of adding info for women), but it looks like it’s back again.
If you read the bios for women who lead the RS, YW and Primary, their education/career is reported. But if you serve with your husband, apparently it’s not relevant.
Yes, Pete, that sort of reporting is one of the several reasons the four pillars kind of thinking remains common, though not pervasive. Merriam-Webster: pervasive — “: existing in or spreading through every part of something “
JR,
The ripples of Ezra Benson’s (and KImball) teachings about the role of women still painfully prevalent in the memories of those of us raised in the 70s and 80s.
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/1981/10/the-honored-place-of-woman?lang=eng
“It is a misguided idea that a woman should leave the home, where there is a husband and children, to prepare educationally and financially for an unforeseen eventuality.”
Then to have the whiplash of the “I’m a Mormon” campaign that prominently featured women who had exciting and rewarding careers in addition to families, after all the scary threats that blamed women for a family’s struggles if she dared step outside her home.
“I do not wish to wound any feelings, but all of us are aware of instances of active Latter-day Saint families who are experiencing difficulties with their children because mother is not where she ought to be—in the home.” And this …”The seeds of divorce are often sown and the problems of children begin when mother works outside the home.”
Please don’t discount the long term effects on women (and men) raised on these teachings.
I had not heard of the four pillars, but I have heard of a book called Fascinating Womanhood, which I would guess the author has based on the four pillars. My LDS friend read it years ago and told us how it changed her marriage. I wanted to gag. One of the suggestions was to make sure that when your husband arrives home from work the house is spotless, dinner is on the table, and the children are behaving properly. There are to be no loud children running about. He sits down in his easy chair and you rub his feet and ask him about his day in a soft tone to decrease his stress. The stress you may have dealt with throughout the day is not important. Everything revolves around the husband and his comfort and happiness. Yep, modern-day four pillars.
yamabeth, I think “Fascinating Womanhood” was written in and reached the height of it’s popularity in the 60s. NOT modern-day by my definition.
I think one of the problems of the four pillars that we still have and is pervasive in the church today is that it is men defining for women how to be women. You never have a talk in the priesthood session where a woman gets up and tells the men how to be men, even though a woman would be quite qualified to inform the men on how to be better husbands and fathers. But every woman and girls session the men get up and tell the women how to be women. The men spend more time informing the women how to be women than the women speakers even do. It is really quite irritating.
Raised in the 70s if I could give you so many more thumbs up!!!
Anna, it’s much much more than simply irritating.
I am painfully familiar with the four pillars (and all their cultural/historical/literary variations.) I was born in the late 60s to very orthodox Mormon parents in California, the types who were intent on fulfilling their duty “to prepare tabernacles for all the spirits they can” and I spent my 70’s childhood and 80’s teen years a place of constant personal sadness and tension, torn between the (personally appealing) “Free to Be You and Me” progressive cultural vibe of the era, and the (personally depressing) heavy-handed pronouncements on the limited appropriate choices for Mormon women.
This pain, and the desire to understand why the men in my religion kept telling me that god wanted women’s lives to be smaller than men’s lives, prodded me early on to seek out and absorb to the vast array of women’s stories and cultural/historical norms, and eventually opened the door to leaving the Mormon church behind.
JR, “Fascinating Womanhood” was written in the 60s but is still in publication. I can confirm that it was widely read and gifted (non-ironically) to young women as late as the mid 80s.
JR, check the Fascinating Women Facebook group/pages and you find thousands of followers.
JR, I looked on the Internet to jog my memory of the name and found it at Target and on Amazon. There were lots of reviews, many of the life-changing kind. Every so often a negative review. The word “Christian” was used in a lot of the reviews I saw. It appears that it’s still popular in the general Christian world.
My wife is currently taking two classes on the Proclamation through BYU-I’s Pathway program. She detests every minute of them, because they hammer home the ideas of the Four Pillars. It is especially a sore spot for her since she is a convert, and the expectation in her Gentile family was that she would get her degree (as her mother had), and continue her formal education. In the LDS family that she married into, she didn’t need any education now that she was married. Her frustration at this discouraging of her continuing her education came to a head when her first husband died and she had no degree and no marketable skills. Had she been permitted to continue her original life plan, she would have had both.
Let’s not forget that it was only 5 years ago that the church allowed women with children at home to be paid full time seminary and institute teachers. Previously they could be full time secretaries, but not teachers.
https://www.deseret.com/2014/11/14/20552727/lds-women-with-children-now-eligible-for-full-time-seminary-institute-jobs
“We previously had not employed women who have minor children at home, in consideration of their important role as mothers,” Webb said. “While we continue to recognize that contribution that they make in their homes, we also recognize that sometimes their personal and family circumstances require them to work.”
And it was only this past March that the church allowed women with children at home to be temple ordinance workers. There was no such restriction on men with children at home.
This isn’t as far behind us as some would like to think.
Fascinating Womanhood, pure evil, was incredibly popular in the late 80s as a gift for LDS women, and its pernicious ideas were taken very seriously at that time. If its author isn’t going to hell, I don’t know who qualifies. That book literally tells women to dress and act like children and to manipulate their husbands with pouting and tears and foot stamping. It’s disgusting. It views both men and women as emotional children (but encourages the women to be cunning about it to trick their husbands), and marriage as a place to control and deceive and manipulate one’s partner.
I recently watched a very disturbing Bette Davis movie from 1948 called June Bride. In this movie, Bette is a 30 something woman who edits a women’s magazine, and her 30-40 year old ex-boyfriend who jilted her 3 years earlier is hired to work for her by her boss who says she’s difficult to work for (which actually never materializes in the actual script–she’s just like everyone else, and particularly nice to this man who jilted her). The magazine team goes to a family home in Indiana to redecorate the house and do a feature about the teen daughter who is marrying the boy next door. As the story unfolds, the younger sister (who looks about 15) is in love with the groom, and the male writer gives her information to get the older boy next door sent home from his military service (apparently that’s a pretty easy thing to do) because the younger sister knows her older sister really loves the older boy, not the one she’s marrying. When the plan succeeds, and the older sister elopes with the older boy, the male writer takes the younger sister over his knee and spanks her (!) even though this isn’t his house. Then, the next day, he devises a plan to pretend to the neighbor boy that he (at over twice her age) wants to marry the younger sister to goad the boy into jealousy. It is creepy as all get out hearing this much older man talking about this very young teenage girl as the object of his affection. Honestly, I wasn’t sure whether the spanking or pitching himself as her suitor was more problematic. Eventually, he ends up with Bette Davis, of course, but only after he comments toward the end of the movie that he has to wear the pants in the family, even though they literally have had no gender equality squabbles in the entire movie. They worked well together, and she was mostly a good boss, and he had no issue with taking direction from her. It’s like the movie had to throw in these incredibly strange ideas after the fact as if they were normal, when they were not at all normal.
That’s sometimes how it feels being in the Church. Most Mormon couples I know are pretty egalitarian, far more than non-LDS couples I know, with both parents working together and supporting each other, not trying to manipulate, control or suppress their partner. But the way we talk about things, the roles “defined” for women, are often so strange and foreign and such a downgrade from reality.
These 4 pillars are still alive and well in modern church teachings. See Elder Christofferson’s talk The Moral Force of Women. This talk is from 2013, a year before the church apparently understood that women had priesthood power and authority. They had moral authority instead. There is some effort for balance in this talk, but the overall message is one of religious devotion, domesticity, and purity for women. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2013/10/the-moral-force-of-women?lang=eng
“Grandma Swenson never learned how to drive a car, but she knew how to help boys become priesthood men.
A woman’s moral influence is nowhere more powerfully felt or more beneficially employed than in the home.”
Then we have in 2013, former YW President Elain Dalton saying the following at a BYU devotional:
“Young women you will be the ones who will provide the example of virtuous womanhood and motherhood. You will continue to be virtuous lovely praiseworthy and of good report. You will also be the ones to provide an example of family life in a time when families are under attack, being redefined and disintegrating. You will understand your roles and your responsibilities and thus will see no need to lobby for rights.”
We also have the Moroni 9:9 scripture about virtue in the printed versions of Personal Progress. It was removed in the online version only about 3 years ago.
In the most current version of the study manual for the Old Testament, we have this quote which refers to a talk from President Kimball. The quote is trying to explain/interpret the Genesis verse where God says Adam should rule over Eve.
“I have a question about the word rule. It gives the wrong impression. I would prefer to use the word preside because that’s what he does. A righteous husband presides over his wife and family.” (Spencer W. Kimball, “The Blessings and Responsibilities of Womanhood,” Ensign, Mar. 1976, p. 72.)”
While the most recent New Testament manual ascribes Paul’s teachings of the submission of wives to husbands to a cultural construction, we’ve had justification for female submission stemming from the Genesis verse for decades. I wonder what the new Come Follow Me Old Testament manual will say on the subject. It’s unfortunate that we have codified women’s submission into official documents like the Family Proclamation and still in our temple sealings.
I could definitely find more examples, but I’ll leave these for now.
I agree with Angela. “Fascinating Womanhood” is an abomination and its author should be consigned to the lowest rung of hell. My mom gave me a copy when I wasn’t asked to the junior prom my junior year in high school. Talk about an insult! My sister and I read the book together and were horrified. This was what our mom and men expected us to behave like? Neither of us could or would play stupid and helpless. When I went to BYU I was shocked by how many guys I knew or dated that wanted a girl straight out of FW. If that’s what it took to find a spouse I was content to be single. After graduation I had the opportunity to date some non-member men who appreciated an intelligent woman who had a lot of interests and hobbies. LDS guys, on the other hand felt very threatened by these same qualities. One would think that a man would want an educated, well rounded woman to be the mother of his children. But that often doesn’t seem to be the case here along the Mormon Corridor. In the Church we tell our young women to get a good education and in the same breath we stress the idea of getting married young and not delaying starting a family. Most of the girls in my YW class did the get married early and have lots of kids quickly routine. I got a college education, worked at two marvelous jobs and married at 30. When I attended a ward reunion I was surprised to see these same girls who were now either divorced or totally worn out with child bearing at age 31. What was sad was that most of them actually envied me for having gotten married later than them because they’d missed out on so much. I just wish that our geriatric leaders would realize that what was acceptable for women 60-70 years ago when they were young adults is no longer true. While some women enjoy being “domestic goddesses” (to use a phrase from FW) and having lots of kids other women don’t. Trying to force all of the women in the Church into a role that only fits some of them just leads to frustration, anger, guilt, and feelings of not being taken seriously.
Attending quarterly Bishop welfare councils which is a quarterly meeting that only bishops in a stake attend and which few members know about – they compare notes about what the other bishops are seeing and they council with one another.
In the meeting I’ve heard numerous times that families with stay at home moms are happier, that women will never have the priesthood, and that a dangerous trend is for women to wear exercise clothing all day but not their garments.
Yes, I see remnants of all four pillars strong in parts of the church.
Well, I see that my experience of the 70s and 80s in Utah County and elsewhere was quite different from a number of others’. By then “Fascinating Womanhood” was dead in the narrow circles in which I moved and thought. I wish it had been dead for others as well. Angela’s last two sentences on the contrast between the way some Mormons talk of gender roles and the reality of roles as lived may explain part of the difference between my limited view and others’. I guess I don’t take a lot of such talk seriously when it doesn’t match behavior I observe. It seems I’ve been blissfully ignorant of how seriously others have taken such talk after the 60s and likely blissfully ignorant of cases in which such talk and behavior did match. So, it seems not only that the Church is not the same everywhere, but also that any two person’s experiences of the Church may be radically different in the same place. Sorry about my ignorance and insensitivity to some others’ experience.
At my age it’s likely idle curiosity, but I wonder what can be done to teach young women not to take that bunk seriously whether it comes from Sister Andelin, Sister Dalton, SWK or others?
“but I wonder what can be done to teach young women not to take that bunk seriously whether it comes from Sister Andelin, Sister Dalton, SWK or others.”
Well that’s the problem isn’t it. When the current prophet and the apostles (and family proclamation,) all spout these ideas how can we tell young women not to follow them?
Angela C, your description of the Bette Davis movie, and others like it, is addressed in the book, Homeward Bound, about Post-WW II America and the societal messages that were created by Hollywood , Politicians, Pundits, etc. it’s very interesting. If any of you have parents that were part of the Silent Generation, everything in the book makes so much sense.
JR,
“but I wonder what can be done to teach young women not to take that bunk seriously whether it comes from Sister Andelin, Sister Dalton, SWK or others.”
The BYU Women’s Conference this year included a Face-to-Face session where the president of the Relief Society commented that “We women tend to be shrill or demanding or stubborn, thinking we have the best idea ever,” Bingham said to audience laughter, “and if they don’t see it our way, clearly there’s a problem here.”
https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2019/05/03/latter-day-saint-womens/
When this kind of undermining of women’s authority and voice comes from the highest female church officer, how do we counteract it? We’re told it’s wrong to criticize our leaders, even when the criticism is valid. We’re told, as women, to speak up but not too much and to not assume a role that’s not ours. We’re supposed to be assertive (within limits) but always submissive to priesthood authority which we may or may not hold. We tell young women not to delay marriage or children, but arbitrarily revoke Medicaid as an acceptable option for them to remain in school while simultaneously not going into debt, getting all the education they can, and multiplying and replenishing the earth. The church tells women not to lobby for rights, but when changes are eventually made that are exactly the thing women were asking for, the church won’t acknowledge women’s advocacy and contribution to the changes.
What suggestions do you have to teach young women to navigate the bunk?
On the one hand, lots of LDS rhetoric reflects this rather dated way of thinking about the role of women. On the other hand, local leaders are more interested in identifying energetic and committed LDS women to serve in key callings in the ward, with little regard to their education, their politics, or their job.
It’s like there is two-track thinking on this, one that is rooted in the past and that informs LDS rhetoric, and a separate track that ignores all of the rhetoric and just values women who can get things done and work with others in callings, the same as local leaders look for men who can get things done and work with others. The practical approach of local leaders is almost entirely disconnected from the LDS rhetoric, the primary purpose of which at this point is simply to confuse LDS youth and make the Church seem unappealing.
A Modern-feminist’s Jaded Back-reading and Misrepresentation of the 19th Century Roles of Women (Ironically Infantilizing Women of That Era )
Hahah, guess that’s what happens when you accidentally press send before completing a thought. I agree, that alone is pretty rude. Let me make an actual point.
Here’s the main issue I have with your portrayal of 19th Century women. Do you really believe men were so wise and cunning, and women were so weak and naive that collectively men were somehow capable of pulling the wool over women’s eyes for hundreds (or thousands) of years? It seems instead of believing women were capable of and took and active role in shaping their own destiny in society, you seem to be suggesting that they were passive agents that had their societal roles prescribed to them by men. And does it not give you a little pause that you are quoting Karl Marx to make a point about religion? Do you seriously believe religion is “a particularly effective tranquilizer for women”, yet another tool for the generally wise and predatory men to keep tricking the generally weak and naive women into submission?
I believe women are and were capable of thinking and making decisions for themselves just as well as men. I think women are and were just as capable of virtue and evil as men (and are just as virtuous and evil as men). And I think this type of passive victim narrative that you are portraying here denies the humanity of women, and I don’t believe it.
Steve, I think the idea that you are missing is that the men back in the 1800s did deny the humanity of women. There were discussions about whether women had souls or not. Are women more like men, or chimpanzees?
Women needed to survive, and they needed to be able to raise children. I think you fail to comprehend the huge disadvantage those two facts gave women in western culture where women were legally children for life. Women couldn’t really fight the battle to be recognized as full humans because they were essentially kept barefoot and pregnant.
Yes, women are just as capable as men and just as human as men, but pregnancy really took them out of commission in a society where women could not be seen in public in their pregnant condition. Where 1/3 of women died in childbirth or from complication from childbirth. Where they were essentially tied to a nursing baby, then two years later another nursing baby, then two years later another nursing baby.
It takes more strength for a woman to just survive in a world like that than for men to survive in that world. But it did make a woman dependent on the father of her babies. Human babies are not like any other species, as they are born more dependent because it is a compromise between their big heads going through the birth canal, and their ability to survive independently. So, human females need the cooperation of the father of their babies just as much as mother penguins do. Which need makes them vulnerable to exploitation. And there are men who have exploited this vulnerability.
“I believe women are and were capable of thinking and making decisions for themselves just as well as men. I think women are and were just as capable of virtue and evil as men (and are just as virtuous and evil as men).”
No, women in the 19th century, almost everywhere throughout the US, were not as free as men to make decisions and think for themselves. Women couldn’t even vote for crying out loud.
What irks me about this remark is that it is a fake cry for gender equality and a fake appeal to a moral high ground by spinning the OP as having some sort of misogynistic blind spot (quoting Marx, treating women as incapable (red herring fallacy)). Nonsense. Embedded in this comment is a willful ignorance to and denial of the historical plight of women. It is either innocently ignorant or cryptically misogynistic. I suspect the latter.
Anna, yes women are, and particularly historically, far more physically vulnerable. That is of course true, and a fact that has shaped our evolutionary history. It’s interesting that you jump to vulnerability = exploitation, as opposed to vulnerability might lead to different preferences between men and women so as to protect that vulnerability – as if women cannot recognize that vulnerability and make appropriate decisions to guard that accordingly. Your view is still couched in a narrative of women being incapable of navigated their nature: as if in large measure they did not want to have families and children. You speak of pregnancy derisively, as opposed to something that is a power and privilege that someone would be proud to take part it. It’s such a bleak view of human nature, and I think it is no wonder this narrative is leading to anger, self-loathing, and power struggles today.
I think deeply embedded in our current cultural thinking is this idea that human history is largely defined as a story of men and women pitted against one another in an ever-bitter battle for power between the sexes, and one where men as predatory beasts succeeded in exploiting weaker and naive women. I think that is an extraordinarily myopic view of humanity, and I think it completely underestimates how hard life was for nearly every human being on earth. If I remember correctly, the average family in the 1800s was living on a dollar a day in today’s money. Poverty, disease, and merely surviving was a daily feat. And are we really imagining they had time to sit around in some sort of battle of the sexes? I think that’s ridiculous – of necessity men and women had to work together just so they could try and survive. It was not like today where through technology we’ve been able to become isolated individualists – everyone had brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, etc. who they depended on for their daily survival. Were there bad people that tried to exploit one another? Most definitely. But did that define the core history between men and women? I don’t think so. I think actually it was the complete opposite of that narrative, that the cooperation between men and women throughout history is the greatest success story in nature, and what allowed humans to become the most successful species on earth. And I think if we hadn’t done so, we wouldn’t have survived.
John W, not fake at all. I genuinely believe this is a serious and destructive blind spot in our current culture, so deeply embedded that merely suggesting it is wrong — well, you see the backlash I’ve already received. We believe everyone that came before us was ignorant, foolish, and exploitative for thousands if not even hundreds of thousands of years of human history, and suddenly we now get it. I find that extraordinarily narrow-minded and arrogant, and furthermore and perhaps most importantly I think our arrogant and self-centered projections onto the past are harming the relationships between men and women today, breaking down the harmony that I believe characterized our species for the majority of our existence halting our continued progression. That you could be convinced that women were not able to “think for themselves”, shows me how far astray this thinking has gone, and I think it’s a false and degrading way to look at our ancestry. I think it’s wrong and so I’m speaking up.
Steve LHJ,
Slavery was the norm for millennia, in almost every culture we find. In fact you could even say that slavery was a building block of human civilizations (cheap labor for large construction projects) for these very millennia. And yet we reject that. I can still revere people of the past who were slave holders (I.e., George Washington) and reject slavery.
If women had equal freedom to think and act as men historically, how come we don’t find more women thinkers and writers in the past? The ability to write down and disseminate ideas is the strongest sign of one’s ability to think for themselves is out not? If women historically have been just as capable of evil as men, how come we don’t see more female mass murderers, like female Hitlers and Pol Pots?
“I genuinely believe this is a serious and destructive blind spot in our current culture, so deeply embedded that merely suggesting it is wrong — well, you see the backlash I’ve already received.”
Seems to be a bit of an overreaction. Silly almost. And the downvotes and people writing civil comments expressing disagreement to your comments are evidence of destructiveness? Sounds a little snowflaky to me. Maybe you need some thicker skin.
History be damned. Contraception is now widely available for both men and women. Women dying during childbirth is fairly rare. Daycare is widely available in developed countries. Working at home is a viable option. Men are told to be more active in raising children. In other words, the game has changed. Women have the strength, intelligence, and leadership skills to change the world. They need a fair playing field.
The Church is the loser when it discriminates against half its membership. I suspect that for many young women this discrimination is a greater concern than issues like Church history, conflicts between science and religion, etc.
“Slavery was the norm for millennia” – not sure how that’s relevant.
“how come we don’t find more women thinkers and writers in the past?” – Why would you assume an inability to think? Assuming oppression to support your narrative of oppression is circular reasoning. Off the top of my head we know of many biological differences between men and women — women are more agreeable, less assertive, lower in openness to ideas, higher in openness proper, and are more interested in people than things, all of which I think would make an impact, particularly as these average differences bubble up and influence the shaping of cultural norms. Look no further than our very own ‘bloggernacle’, what is the ratio of men to women writing and participating in this open and public sphere of ideas? It’s very clearly dominated by men. Do you take this as evidence that women today are not as capable as men in being able to think for themselves?
Yes, men are more given to physical violence, whereas women are more given to relational aggression. Furthermore as men are on average less agreeable than women, at the extreme ends of the distribution the effects are compounded – almost all the most disagreeable people by temperament are going to be men, hence why 90% of inmates are men. Just because the evil is manifested in different ways according to temperamental preference provides no evidence of total capacity for evil. Choosing a dimension dominated by men and then extrapolating makes no sense. That would be like saying the vast majority of famous physicists and mathematicians are men, and therefore we can conclude that men are smarter than women, it’s an extrapolation error taking into account a very narrow subset of data. Furthermore, if you believe women are not as capable of evil they cannot be as virtuous. they would just be more harmless. A rabbit for example is not virtuous, it is merely harmless, virtue is measured in direct proportion to a person’s capacity for evil and still choosing the good.
“the downvotes and people writing civil comments expressing disagreement to your comments are evidence of destructiveness” – I didn’t say that, as the hyphen indicated I was using the backlash as evidence of how deeply embedded this cultural narrative is, and I said nothing about that being evidence of the destructiveness of the narrative..
““Slavery was the norm for millennia” – not sure how that’s relevant.”
I wrote this in response to your comment, “We believe everyone that came before us was ignorant, foolish, and exploitative for thousands if not even hundreds of thousands of years of human history, and suddenly we now get it”
Yes. Women before the modern period were largely treated as chattel, property, and were mostly powerless and voiceless. For millennia. Across most cultures. Yes, there are exceptions. Don’t confuse those for general norms. The lack of female writers and political leaders in the past is a testament to this. Women today fill all sorts of political positions and write all sorts of influential works. Why didn’t they fill political positions and write great works, with only a handful of exceptions, in the past? Millennia of oppressive cultural norms.
“[The Bloggernacle is] very clearly dominated by men. Do you take this as evidence that women today are not as capable as men in being able to think for themselves?”
1) It is? Do you have any data to back this up? 2) We hear countless female voices expressed in a wide array of settings today where we didn’t hardly at all 100+ years ago. You’ve been claiming that the OP, by pointing out historic oppressive misogynistic cultural norms, some of which continue to infiltrate our culture today, is somehow destroying our culture because it insinuates that women historically couldn’t think for themselves. Look, the truth is that historically women mostly couldn’t think for themselves due to oppressive cultural norms that pervaded civilizations around the world, in the same way that norms that tolerated slavery were built into civilizations and cultures for millennia, which we now rightfully reject. Hence we find very, very few female writers and thinkers before the modern age. You’re simply not recognizing this historical reality and seem to be in a sort of IDW-influenced denial about it. Even worse, you’re trying to find lame excuses to paint the OP as misogynistic, which is just plain bizarre. I’ve noticed this sort of behavior by IDW (Intellectual Dark Web, a newfangled reactionary thinking that you seem influenced by) folks with regards to feminism and racism. In their obsessive and endless campaign against the so-called SJWs and “political correctness”, it is almost as if they try to out-SJW the SJWs. “You think you’re woke because you point out misogyny and racism,” they say to a supposed SJW (in many cases, this person is very mainstream and is pointing out obvious racism and misogyny). “Oh yeah, well I’m woker than you because I point out all sorts of racism against whites and discrimination against men.” It is as if they seek to elevate themselves by claiming a sort of fake victimhood narrative where whites and men are collectively the victims of all sorts of discrimination, but can never quite land a clear argument or coherent narrative and attract only other rabid feminist-hating, SJW-hating mostly white males.
“1) It is? Do you have any data to back this up? ” This is a known phenomenon: https://religionnews.com/2015/01/06/mormon-women-blog-commenters/ .
So again, I will ask, Do you take this as evidence that women today are not as capable as men in being able to think for themselves?
“You’ve been claiming that the OP, by pointing out historic oppressive misogynistic cultural norms, some of which continue to infiltrate our culture today, is somehow destroying our culture because it insinuates that women historically couldn’t think for themselves.”
I did not say that. I”m pointing out that treating all of human history as a story where women are passive victims incapable of controlling and shaping their place and destiny in society, is a very myopic and bleak view of humanity, and denies women their humanity as it inherently assumes and views women as incapable. You don’t seem to be denying this as you continue to defend the premise “historically women mostly couldn’t think for themselves”.
“Look, the truth is that historically women mostly couldn’t think for themselves due to oppressive cultural norms that pervaded civilizations around the world… Hence we find very, very few female writers and thinkers before the modern age.”
Reasserting your conclusion as fact is not evidence, again you are using circular reasoning and your conclusion does not follow. The rest of your comment doesn’t appear to have a point other than to make accusations without evidence.
Re: women and the Bloggernacle/internet, I don’t know about anyone else but when I’ve written something that people want to respond to they invariably assume I’m a guy. alice is pretty clearly female but when I’ve used any screen name that isn’t specifically a name — even if it’s gender specific like, say “XXchromosomes” or “cybergal” — I’m addressed as just another cyberbro. Even women do it.
Assumptions that the ether belongs to or is dominated by men may be a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I’m late in the discussion, and sorry to contribute to ganging up on you, Steve, but some random thoughts in response to your arguments:
(1) “I think deeply embedded in our current cultural thinking is this idea that human history is largely defined as a story of men and women pitted against one another…” Most of what I remember from history is a bunch of guys and almost no women doing stuff. To say that history is “largely defined” by a battle of the sexes seems grossly inaccurate. But probably I am nitpicking your word choices. The larger idea you seem to be advocating is that the idea that men historically oppressed women is destructive and false. Is this correct? I won’t address “destructive” just yet, but let’s talk about “false.” Historically, women could not vote. Women could not inherit property. Women had no legal right to their children if they left the father. Is it your position that women, by nature, did not want these responsibilities? Some of the relatively few female voices of recent history — Jane Austen, Louisa May Alcott — said otherwise through their novels. Yes, it sucked back then for pretty much everyone. That doesn’t mean all sucking was equal. Difficulty can encourage cooperation, but it also encourages competition. There has, of course, been massive cooperation between the sexes, but not all cooperation results in an even exchange. If one party has more leverage over the other, the other is, to some degree, at the mercy of the party with more leverage. Which leads to the next point.
(2) “It’s interesting that you jump to vulnerability = exploitation, as opposed to vulnerability might lead to different preferences between men and women so as to protect that vulnerability – as if women cannot recognize that vulnerability and make appropriate decisions to guard that accordingly.” I’m not clear on what you mean by this, so my defensive feminist self is jumping to the worst possible conclusion that you are saying women only have themselves to blame if they are exploited — also known as “victim blaming.” Please correct me. But to say women were oppressed is not to say they were weak or naive or incapable. (Nor does the OP state that anywhere.) Back to the theme of slavery, to bring up that people were enslaved is not to call them weak or say they didn’t make appropriate decisions to guard their freedoms. It says a great deal about the people who enslaved them, though.
(3) Speaking of the practical ramifications of pregnancy isn’t “derisive.” It’s a “power” and a “privilege” that I am proud to have been a part of — but it’s also paradoxically one of the most degrading and soul-sucking things I’ve done as well. It can be sacred and miraculous and still a condition that can be taken advantage of. It seems there’s more than one verse of scripture to the effect of “woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck” recognizing that a woman’s vulnerability can be exploited.
Steve seems to be saying: Men are physically stronger than women. Men and women know this. Women can have babies. Men and women know this. So they both agree that men should do physical things and women have babies. That’s a good story. The story, in fact. This cooperation is the success of human history. Anything else–you know, the whole, women are property, women shouldn’t vote, women shouldn’t be able to hold land, women shouldn’t have any say in financial matters, women shouldn’t want anything other than motherhood (as if they were exclusive), women shouldn’t/can’t etc.–is just noise, because, you know, both men and women know that men are physically stronger and women can have babies, and if you point to those other oppressions, you are just denying what men and women know, and because they know this, it isn’t oppressive, especially since women chose their roles (if nothing else) in order to have the realm of influence that they wanted, which was motherhood; that women couldn’t participate in these other things doesn’t matter, because they didn’t want to; which is to say, yes, we can consider these restraints on women as oppression, but men have always allowed the women to have and get what they wanted in the first place, which is motherhood (even at the cost of all those other privileges and rights that men had and said, dictated, threatened that women couldn’t have–which is ironic, he must admit, because if women didn’t want these things, why codify their prohibition?), and, in the end, regardless of historical and contemporary evidence that suggests otherwise, Steve knows all this because it is a ‘nicer’ story about women (and men, to be honest), and he is a man and has thought about it.
Steve LHJ,
In your link, it does show that on a particular blog, women do not comment as much as men. Yet it does write: “Women provided the majority of comments only in the sections of the site devoted to weddings, aging, parenting, dining, and fashion”
What this shows is that women tend to be interested in writing about different things than men. Still, women are interested in writing and do write in the modern age. And more so than men on particular topics. There is no doubt about that. This does not confirm your implicit point that the dearth of female writers in the past is not evidence that they couldn’t think for themselves. Before the modern age, women didn’t write about weddings, parenting, dining, and fashion.
Historically most thinking had to be done within a limited framework, even for men, and had to conform to particular norms. Humanity enjoys more freedom of thought today than we ever have. Still, in many societies, such as many Muslim countries, people do not enjoy full freedom of thought and cannot fully think for themselves. However, men were historically almost always the one who either were seen as the guardian writers of social norms or the ones who transcending social barriers to express thought freely. Women simply weren’t. Historically they had much, much less freedom to think than men. You need to recognize this. IDW really stands for intellectually dishonest web.
Are we counting LDS mommy blogs as being part of the bloggernacle? If we are, then at least in their heyday, the bloggernacle definitely swung female.
Steve LHJ,
If a tree falls in the woods, and there is no one to hear it, does it make a sound? Acting like the OP says that women couldn’t think for themselves, and thus does them a disservice is just as ridiculous as saying the tree never fell, so it doesn’t matter. Of course women could think for themselves, and did, but because of the systemic oppression over CENTURIES, their thinking was not valued or heard. Society in general is coming to recognize this, and thankfully, finally allowing women’s voices and thinking to be heard. That is very much what the post is about…in the church, are we hearing women’s thinking, or are women still getting filtered and censored by men? In our history, and our canon, there are very few women’s voices. Typically, only the ones that are in support of the male narrative are heard. There are thousands of trees falling, and no one is listening, or will not acknowledge that the sound is actually deafening.
The four pillars are definitely in full effect. Last time I was in primary children were singing, “a father’s role is to provide, preside”, and “mother teaches to pray, obey” (I think? I could be wrong)
In my life, my husband was asked first if I could accept a calling, I was denied a temple recommend interview until my husband could do his, was referred to as “my-husband’s-name”’s wife when asked to pray. Which may not sound horrific, but my husband was never even active, and didn’t attend any of these wards (3 different wards, 3 different bishops). So please, believe that women can speak for themselves, and always have had the intellect to do so, we are talking about whether or not society, institutions, the church, are listening.
John W,
You’re just repeating your position and not providing evidence, and you’re not engaging with the points I’ve made to even consider an alternative. I’m fine if you disagree with everything I say, you can think whatever you want. I’m suggesting there is a deeply engrained cultural view in how we look at the past that I think it is flawed to our detriment, and I’ve made my case for that. In response I’ve only had the current narrative (that I already know well and think is flawed) repeated back to me, telling me “You need to recognize this”. That’s just not a convincing argument and throwing labels around without evidence is not helpful either; it’s no longer a conversation, so I’ll bow out.
MakesMeWonder,
“Of course women could think for themselves” – Yes, that’s the point I am making. It’s others that are making the argument that that is not the case, because when you follow that to its logical end, it puts the current narrative of systemic oppression in question. That’s not say there was no systemic oppression, there most definitely was, it ways that hurt women and also ways that hurt men. But I think the narrative of passive female victims unable to escape oppression from cruel and domineering men for thousands of years is untenable when you see men and women, humans, as being capable and more three dimension, full of good and evil. This all good / all bad, unilateral oppressor / oppressed narrative is too much of a caricature to be believable to me, I just don’t think humans are like that.
ReTx, fair point :).
Steve,
I don’t see where you are getting that others are saying women were not capable of thinking for themselves. I read the quotes in the OP and comments as reading that historically, society has ACTED like women can’t think for themselves, as EVIDENCED BY the systemic oppression. (Not using caps to yell, but rather add distinction :)) There is a huge difference here, as you would claim it signifies a narrative of “passive victimhood” of women and villainy of men; but that humans are better than that. This is off the mark; yes, humans are certainly capable of better, on that we can agree, but the question lies in HOW are we working towards that capability as a society, and especially as a church? How does the narrative of women in the church show progress toward recognition of independent thought and a woman’s individual worth as a child of God? Are we still systematically oppressing women with views that narrow our ability to affect change, even change for ourselves? As an example from the “pillars” in the OP: Are women told that we are to be in charge of governing men’s religiosity, while simultaneously always having to have a man make the final decision? These are the reasons that this post is important. Are we (as a church) moving toward all that we are capable of, or are we still entrenching half our membership in the backstory of the past?
I do realize this is subject to opinion, but it is certainly an issue dear to my heart. I want to believe that we as humans are better, and can cooperate. I don’t have an issue with family members and couples taking on different responsibilities; however, I do think it’s oppressing, as well as counterproductive, to have an outside institution decide what roles you can fulfill. Similarly, your earlier claim that “biologically” women are more agreeable and less aggressive than men; that is very narrowing and oppressive to traits that both men and women possess, and contributes to a narrative of women not being able to make tough decisions, because, you know, we are just agreeable and passive. It’s ridiculous and offensive to women; and I, (as a woman), will aggressively and not agreeably point that out to you. Also, give me an example of how systemic oppression has hurt men; I’m genuinely curious on where you could take this, and I love to broaden my perspective through listening to others (for real) 😉
Steve LHJ,
Originally you wrote:
“Do you really believe men were so wise and cunning, and women were so weak and naive that collectively men were somehow capable of pulling the wool over women’s eyes for hundreds (or thousands) of years?”
And yet the OP talks of a limited time frame of 1820-1860 in the US.
You were off target from the beginning.
“it’s no longer a conversation”
Was it ever?
Very nicely written and narrated hawkgirl. My sincere compliments. I will do all in my power to ensure that my own daughters, sons, grand-daughters and grand-sons are never polluted or damaged by the teachings of “these men”; who back in a day did all that they could….to rule over women. Home run, with this one!!
I am going to comment on this blogpost just to skew the responses in the direction of women. I came across the ideas of FW as a young mom. It was the most revolting thing I had ever heard of, but echoes of the thinking whistled through my lessons in YW, discussions with my dad, and other exposures to “LDS culture.” I set my face to the wind with a “damned if I don’t ” attitude that I was going to graduate from a non-LDS university and a strong foundation in the gospel. But it took a lot of chutzpah, and I felt like I was actively bucking the expectation. I also found that I could have more meaningful discussions about ANYTHING with non-LDS men or recent concerts. It is like my way of thinking nd career planning didn’t compute for LDS men. Socialization is a strong strong force for how people think. And yes, I think the societal views of womanhood from early 19th century definitely echo all the way to present.