Did You know?
- Women ministers in 1915 were reluctantly hired and then required
to "do a great deal more work than the men (ministers) and for half
the salary."
See Chapter 3
- A certain group of males today continues to offer a daily prayer
of thanksgiving to God that they are not women.
See Introduction
- The male dominated Protestant ministry was one of the first
professions to encounter proposals to admit women but one of the last to
do so.
See Chapter 3
- Apparently U.S. policy in Afghanistan (and who knows where
else) encourages what Judith Hand and John Perkins call the "biological
imperative of spreading sperm."
See Chapter 4
- Using Viagra, a drug used to treat impotence, to supplant the
customary gifts of cash and weapons to gain the cooperation of Afghan warlords
is not a policy female leaders would set.
See Chapter 4
- Womankind Worldwide reports that 80% of Afghan women suffer
domestic violence, 60% of marriages are coerced, and half of women are
married before the age of 16.
See Chapter 4
- Women chosen in 1960 to train as astronauts had the right stuff
but were eventually barred (and later reconsidered) because of their sex.
See Chapter 8
- Apparently the first public acknowledgment that women may be
needed in space travel came from an internationally known NASA scientist
who told a college audience in November 1962 that he found "amusing"
a colleague's idea that "women in space could be used sexually by
male astronauts."
See Chapter 8
- The director of the Manned Spacecraft Center in 1962 bragged
to friends that NASA was "reserving 110 pounds of payload for recreational
equipment."
See Chapter 8
- The only scientific report about women's fitness to be astronauts,
published in the Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology (1964), concluded,
"menstruating women are inattentive and prone to accidents."
See Chapter 8
- The list of warnings against women's participation in scientific
or other explorations (they crumble in a crisis, fight with each other,
complain of boredom, or instigate sexual encounters) gained a new excuse
in the 20th century: "no facilities for women."
See Chapter 7
- The first American woman to be courageous enough to flaunt
the prohibition of women speaking publicly was Maria B. Miller Stewart,
a free African-American, who had the courage to stand up and speak out
before an abolitionist meeting in Boston in 1832.
See Chapter 7
- In contrast, a white woman named Emma Hart Willard followed
the social rules of decorum by addressing the New York legislature in 1819
while seated to avoid the appearance of speaking in public.
See Chapter 7
- Infanticide was the most common crime in Europe until the end
of the 18th century when the "demand for child labor," not "improvement
in diet, housing or health," accounted for the falling death rate
of children during this period.
See Chapter 8
- Throughout history women have thrived as second-class citizens
in a male-dominated world because they do exactly what dandelions do---they
adapt to their environment.
See Chapter 11
- Science now recognizes that girls are more mature at birth
and develop one to two years faster than boys, just as Martin Luther admitted
in 1533 when he labeled girls "weeds."
See Chapter 11
- Harriet Tubman was the warrior/goddess who did not let enslavement
and mistreatment stop her from fighting back in a 19th century culture
where African Americans were the property of white males and treated like
animals.
See Chapter 11
- Anne Marbury Hutchinson stood up for civil liberties and religious
toleration in the early 1600s when she dared conduct biblical studies with
friends.
See Chapter 11
- Anne Marbury Hutchinson was banished from the Massachusetts
colony for violating the 5th Commandment because she did not honor her
"fathers in the colony" and her "fathers in the church,"
(her own father was dead).
See Chapter 11
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