The Power in Knowing Our Past

I am grateful to be taking part in this Changemakers’ Lab in an unusual way. I want to read and absorb all that everyone here is doing, while bringing in stories of the distant past that have been discovered by women researchers, notably Max Dashu. 

This story is about the persecution of women in Europe between the 1400’s and 1800’s. My ancestresses. It is a painful past and holds emotionally difficult information, important to continue to make known, but understandable if this is not information that you are wanting to absorb. It is shocking. The film The Burning Times holds graphic images, art from the 1700’s-1800’s. This film was made by women in the National Film Board of Canada in 1990. 

This story also points to the source of the attacks which were at that time the Christian Churches of Rome and England, spread through colonization. I in no in any way mean to disrespect anyone’s spiritual beliefs.  What I am bringing is information about how the violence of that time remains connected to violence against women today. I honour every form of spiritual practise that brings love and respect to us all. I respect all religious choices whose purpose is to bring us together in peace in so many beautiful ways. I hope to witness one day an apology from the Churches and Governments that promoted this violence.

I am reminded annually. Halloween is always bittersweet, that time of year that is the halfway point between autumn and winter, as night grows longer and darkness increases, a time in which we remember our ancestors. I wondered as a girl why women were portrayed as laughable ugly old witches, both ridiculed and feared. As a young adult I dug deeper as did other women, and we shared stories about “The Burning Times” widespread in Europe, when millions of people, mostly women were tortured, drowned, thrown onto fires, outcast, accused by religious organizations, governments and individual men of consorting with the devil and of being dangerous to the community.

I held onto tiny bits of information, that women knew herbs, were midwives, sought out as healers. As medicine began to be taken over by men in Europe, the women were killed as witches. It was described so matter of factly. I learned that it had happened over centuries and spread to North and South America and other parts of the world by warring men travelling from Europe. The extent and viciousness of the tortures and murders of women have been known for some time, only briefly mentioned in history books if mentioned at all. Women speaking about it were seen as biased trouble makers. The magnitude of cruelty that took place geographically and over centuries and the reasoning behind it is still largely hidden. What we have been searching for and trying to create is a world in which everyone is respected in a global community of no violence. Evidence that this has existed in many parts of the world back through time and still today is being researched and made available.

I learned about Max Dashu some years ago. She and a number of women have devoted their lives to researching what has happened throughout time, reaching back to thousands of years bce. Max has created a library of documented visual and written information, times before this current persecution of women that has brought such extreme and widespread violence. I wanted to understand why and where the persecution of women began, and how this is connected to us being still so disrespectfully and violently treated today.

I dove into studies led by Max which have brought me to a new level of understanding of the length of time and details of the witch persecutions, the many countries involved, the reasoning behind it and how the violence, subjugation and injustices against women and girls today are directly connected to the persecution of women as witches between the 11th century and ongoing today, and that this has always included the betrayal of people with disabilities and people living in poverty, subjected to the same treatment. I wanted to understand more about the “witch burning times” given the stories from World Pulse sisters that women are still being accused of being witches, ostracized, violated, banished to “witch camps”, murdered. 

In my own country the taunt of “witch” is still so common when a man doesn’t like what a woman is saying. This word witch still effectively silences women, forming a disconnection from women whose voices are considered too loud. The annual tradition of laughing at old women witch caricatures every Halloween keeps it alive. We are accused of being humourless as we watch and experience this ongoing violence against women and girls.

We get glimpses into our history, but so much has been twisted or hidden. This is why I cherish the Storytelling here on World Pulse that comes from our own experiences, and this is why I felt it important to take the time to explore the Suppressed Histories that Max has spent years researching for us all. As I have written before, Max is a very early member of World Pulse and is glad that I’m sending news of her ongoing discoveries of how women have been treated throughout time. 

Every form of persecution of women as witches has to be stopped. Forcing women into witch camps, robbed of homes and life work, slurs and beatings behind closed doors, this presumption is passed on through generations that men are “naturally born to lead”, have a right to be boss, a right to dominate women, a right to money and property only in their names, the right to the work that pays, the choice of who they marry, the right to beat, sexually violate, psychologically dominate women and girls, and to be the dominant leaders of governments and religious institutions. This is a continuation of the 1100’s to 1800’s during which the persecution and murdering of women as witches was developed in full sadistic action. It has been spread globally through colonialism.

I understand better now how the taunt of “witch” is still used effectively to silence women. The cruelty during those years involved banishment, throwing on fires, dunking into water to drown, torturing in torture chambers, holding captive in “witch towers”, enclosing our foremothers’ heads in metal cages with metal spikes under their tongues, and sexual violence in the name of taking control of our wicked sexual energy in league with the devil. This irrational fear of women’s sexuality is still seen in the punishing of women for leaving the house at all, the accusation of being sexually loose to be walking in the street alone, for wearing what we want, for living independent lives. Floods, droughts, losses and anything that goes wrong with men’s lives continue to be blamed on women. 

It is horrible to look at, but I felt it important to understand, as it is this same treatment of women that we are working to stop today. Still rampant is the silencing and ridiculing of our voices, the dismissal of old women, the betrayal of people living in poverty, of people with disabilities, of men considered not “manly”, the control of medicine, the control of who owns land, property and money. We are expected to remain silent as we continue to witness or experience the ongoing lack of justice for women being beaten up, controlled, sexually assaulted, murdered by individual men, in homes or on the street. We are expected to remain silent despite the ongoing ridiculing of our sexuality through how we are dressed or simply that we are bold enough to be walking freely. We are held responsible for being raped, expected to stay silent despite the uncontrolled sharing of photos and videos of our naked bodies online, the videos of women and girls being raped, with mistrust and punishment for being unmarried, for being unaccompanied in public, especially if we dare to speak out. 

We are living with the vestiges of these persecution times, held in place by governments, justice courts, religions, news sources, literature, schools, online sites. Continuing to actively discriminate against women and girls, choosing to not intervene, continuing to support and even glamorize male control.

We have a long history of violent oppression of women and girls. I refuse that any of this is acceptable, knowing well that this excuse that “change takes time” has been repeated for centuries. I shake off the accusation of being “too radical” for speaking out about old and new forms of harming and silencing women and girls. I celebrate the strength of our connections and that we continue to grow in numbers and through our powerful web of connections here.

Let’s scrutinize where this ridiculing and silencing, this violence and suppression of women’s leadership is coming from by challenging those promoting the cover-up and the excuses. It is a joy to be working together for change in our lifetime. There is no excuse for a world in which we are threatened for even speaking out that a woman has been harmed or murdered. It is a lie that it has always been this way, and a lie that it is this way everywhere. My hope lies in women like Max Dashu who has dedicated her life to prove that there is a different story from what we continue to be told. The herstory of women. My hope lies in what we are doing here, connecting with each other through World Pulse, making known all of the extraordinary work being done and celebrating that now we are able to work all together.

Film

The Burning Times National Film Board of Canada

https://www.nfb.ca/film/burning_times/

Article by Max Dashu

Reign of the Demonologists (on torture and sexist demonology)

http://www.suppressedhistories.net/secrethistory/demonologists.html