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www.uppitywomen.net]
(a web magazine for women who don't know their place) :D
Hare Krsna Women: Blending Cultures In The Hare Krsna Movement by Tapati Sarasvati
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For the next twelve years, I continued to practice the principles of bhakti yoga apart from any official organization, although I did listen to lectures by my godbrother (fellow disciple of Prabhupada) Siddhaswarupanada on cassette tape. He had founded an organization apart from ISKCON called Science of Identity. He also spoke out against the idea of "appointed gurus", and maintained that gurus appear as such by their qualifications, not by some political method as appointment. He believed that Prabhupada knew that and would not have appointed gurus, but would have relied on the Board of Directors (called the GBC or Governing Body Commission) to keep order until some of Prabhupada's disciples clearly demonstrated the qualities of a bona fide guru.
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Official interviews of devotee women always reflected the official position in the philosophy. Devotees were always expert at presenting everything in the movement as they knew Prabhupada would want it to be. So for American journalists or researchers, devotee women would always claim that no, of course we don't feel inferior to men because we are not these bodies. On the spiritual platform we are equal. But in the material world we must make these distinctions. And no, we don't want to do the jobs that men do
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Quoted : While it is tempting to view the devotee woman as marginal to the Krishna society because of the sexism implied by the movement's adherence to traditionalist sex roles, this view ultimately rests on an outsider's analysis (it is an assessment that rests on the assumption that women should be equal in all ways with men). Many, if not most, Krishna women see their role as complementary and ultimately equal to the role played by men. - Rochford then admits that not all women adjust completely and some leave because they cannot accept the position of women in the movement.
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Nevertheless, our confidence was diminished by our status. Our relationships with our husbands, when we married, were negatively affected by our strict roles. We were supposed to treat our husband as our guru, and unquestioningly accept his authority over us. And yet we could see, by close association, that some of our husbands were not truly superior to us either in intellect or devotional behavior.
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From my experience and personal conversations with other devotee women, few wholeheartedly accepted their lower status. We engaged in a number of strategies that I see as attempts to lessen the sting of the "less intelligent" label that was placed on us. Besides relying on the knowledge that our souls were fully equal, we often pointed out examples of male stupidity and remarked on how "conceited" the men were. We also took refuge in verses that indicated we had more natural piety.
oh yes, the complimentary roles subsequently equal to men - but who is suppossed to be washing whose feet? The author recalls all the bitchiness, who was wearing too much jewellery, whose skirt was too short, whose boobs were too big (hey Krishna gave these to me ok - I can't help it) It is a shame she didn't have more perspective from SOI where the competition for a husband is [i:e636df3ade][b:e636df3ade]fierce![/b:e636df3ade][/i:e636df3ade] women outnumbering men by at least 10 to 1. It doesn't suprise me that I have had a couple of tips about devotees taking on multiple wives now.
All the women I knew were constantly bitching about their husbands, I never saw a couple betray any sign of affection. On the contrary it was difficult to tell who was married to who when they didn't seem to even speak to each other at gstherings. I was suprised to find out that one long married couple used to attend the same kirtans seperately, travelling from the same home in different cars and not even talking to each other or glancing in the other's direction when they were there. I later found out that it was common knowledge that the husband had had an affair. Pretty much everyone's relationship is common knowledge - it is as if there is a competition as to who hated their husband, the idea that the more you sufferred the more you must be pleasing to Krishna.
It reminds me of gay christians, not that I have any objection to gay people and I don't care what they want to do with their spiritual time, but I do wonder why on earth you would or could follow a spiritual path that you feel you have to revise to suit yourself. You really might as well just start your own religion. It is just outright delusional. I would have honestly loved to be a good devotee wife - hell I was to a jerk that [i:e636df3ade]knew[/i:e636df3ade] it and admitted it by all his "you are [b:e636df3ade]so[/b:e636df3ade] much better than her" 's. Give me a husband to treat as my guru and a baby or two and a kitchen and I would have been happy as the proverbial pig in mud (not quite as dirty though with the once a month rule maybe :wink: )
It's a damn shame that when he was pirating christianity Siddha didn't get the first thing that I learned at Sunday school - that God is Love. Imagine that.