There is something happening in the USA against almost everything the country has tried to become in the last 50 years. There is a welcome return to barbarism through Trumpism.  We saw it in his belligerent name calling, his callous words about his opponents, his vicious treatment of women throughout the years, and his open admission to being a serial sexual predator. He has opened the sluice gates, and I feel a tide of men once again looking at women as something to be used solely for their own pleasure, kept pregnant and subservient.  New laws enacted seeking control over a woman’s body, especially her reproductive organs, is the ultimate in slavery.

We have lost manners, civility and empathy. I think partly women are to blame for years of asserting ourselves against the old boys clubs and the staunch bastions of men’s rule. We should have expected the backlash, but since it has been a long time in coming we were taken by surprise, not realizing how it had been festering for decades.

50 years ago I worked to have the Equal Rights Amendment passed and now, 50 years later, it still hasn’t passed, and in this climate never will. As an old time feminist activist, I can only look with horror at the world today.

Not so long ago, I parked in a McDonald’s lot to have a burger in my car. The lot was empty, and I parked in the shade in an empty row on a far side. A car pulled in right next to me with two teenagers, the boy driving. In full sight of me, the girl proceeded to give the him a blow job. He clearly wanted me to see his control and superiority.

Sex has been taken out of love and turned into an act as important as brushing your teeth or taking a dump. It has been that way since men took control, branding the Goddess a whore, and her practices abomination.

It is only since the late 1950’s men understood women could have orgasms. Not that they cared. My generation, and those that came before me, were taught sex was something women had to endure.  It was a service to be grudgingly performed for their men.  Women had to shut up if they weren’t good enough at sex, because it was always their fault if their men went elsewhere to satisfy their needs.

Sure, sex can be a lot of fun and very enjoyable. No contest on that. But it is also  something special.  Sex creates life, and it can also create a togetherness between two people. It is taking off your clothes, putting your body against another’s.  Life doesn’t get more intimate or trusting for a woman to allow a man to penetrate her, and for a man, to allow the favorite part of his body to be engulfed by her. Reducing yourself to a naked defenseless being is the ultimate gift to one another, but todays younger generations dismiss it as nothing.

What a loss of mutual respect, understanding and valuing each other. This loss has extended to the political arena and to life in general, when almost half of the country believes it’s all right for a man to rule, who thinks he can grab any woman he wants by the pussy because of his position.

The Goddess is weeping.