...but in reality this oppresses women and has catastrophic effects.

Unaware oppression is one of the key elements that is making women the poorest of the poor. This has enormous implications for how development work is to be done. It has huge effects on the women. It not only affects emotional health, education and health, and physical health, but also many other areas. If researched one could go through almost any area of poverty and women and probably see how it relates back to unaware oppression of the genders.

When people grow personal gardens often times they will weed the garden by hand. They will pull out all of the plants that are not productive for fruit. In this weeding it is essential that the entire root is pulled out of the soil if it is not the weed will continue to grow. Many times if people do not know to pull up the entire plant they will simply chop off the top and think it will go away. This is what has been done by many in development work. The �weeds� of the developing world are seen but instead of pulling the root out of the ground all that is done is to cut off the top. Unaware oppression of women is a root. It must be pulled out if women are ever to rise out of poverty.

Personal Reflections

Unaware oppression has been the practice for millenniums. Some of these forms of oppression are obvious and others hidden. If there is a factor that crosses cultural and religious barriers this is it. It is in Christianity, Buddhism, and Islam. It is in America and in the third world. It is a problem that is tremendous.

When looking at unaware oppression it is not a matter of making men and women the same, rather it is a matter of giving them the same opportunities and seeking to meet their basic needs with the same priority. Both are equally important before the Lord and both are equally valuable in the family structure.

It takes much reflection to look into one�s own culture and notice the inconsistencies. But if anyone takes time to stop, look around, and really examine things that only seem like they are small problems, he/she will begin to see this thread running through his/her culture of women being used. In my own culture I have seen it in unequal home duties, women doing ministry in church yet not being at all recognized, women�s opinions not being valued as much, just the idea that it is the man that is the bread winner. It is not whether any of these things are true or not, rather are the women being given the choice. If they are not, if they are forced into a role because they are women, then that is when one must become aware of this unaware oppression.

When it happens in the first world the consequences are very damaging. When it happens in the third world the consequences are deadly. In the third world the effects are magnified by the extreme poverty that has taken hold of its countries....

Your paper made me cry. Especially the closing part which hit on the personal reflection.

Honestly, I think as women, we really are trained to just accept the unequal status as part of the warp and woof of everyday life. How do you fight against it? To do so, as women, entails the stereotypes of "Femi-Nazi" and prideful, and haughty, and the exact antithesis to feminine, desirable, and suitable for serving the Lord as a quiet wife and mother... Even when the discerning ones of us see and feel it, and can name it, we still do not know what to do.

I, along with most women, do not seek power and change in the same way that men do. When discussing women's issues with men, I often hear the buck passed, and the "Well then do something about it" line. In a sense, it is like asking slaves to set themselves free.

"Plan an overtaking. Make a better life for yourself. Don't let them treat you like that."

Fine and well, but the issue is that there is no room for them to actually do that for themselves. The world in which they live does not give them that power. If they did, in fact, set themselves free, there would be no where for them to live. They would never actually be free. Unless they could get out and get to the North, they had still been trained as slaves, and lacked the resources for making it in a white-free-man's world.

But the absurdity of thinking the slave could or would actually "set himself free" is considerable. He has not been trained to think of himself as an individual with the same permissions as the white man. He does not know what to do. All he has ever known is oppression, and the drive within the human being is often survival first, life betterment later.

Freedom is a gift.

Christ understood that. God did not look at us in our sin-bound state, and shout down at us from heaven.

"Well then free yourselves, you fools!"

Instead, He came, as one of us, and took into Himself the sin and fear that bound us.

He delivered us.

What I was saying about being a woman.

It is somewhat similar. I cry because no one ever cares that it is unequal. Or far too few. And even the men that we love the most, and that treat us the best, still tell us things that diminish our value and hope for equality. And, to change it, we are expected to do it ourselves---under the man's system. But we are not men. Nor do we work like men. Most women do not value the same things, or seek to influence others in the same manner. We are gloriously different. Just not equally heard.

I face this not in a lack of nutrition. I am not a slave who lives in the South. I have made it to the North; however, my sisters have not. And I still have to eat in a different restaurant. I still have to go to a different school.

I now know 4 men who reflect to me hope.

Surely there are a few others.

You know what the fact that you see this does, don't you?

God hates masogeny Matt. He always has. He hates oppression. It took Him a long time to send His deliverer to the people of Israel, but look at what Egypt faced when they refused to obey the Lord, and Let His people go!

The heart of God says the same thing to men today. "Let my people go."

Do not bind her to her life of being your slave. She is your partner. Equal. Companion. Helper. Rescuer. Do not hoard over her your physical strength and superiority. Do not ogle her as if all she has to give this world is a soft, curved figure and beautiful body. Her value is not in her sex appeal, or in her nurturing ability, or way she can host a good party, though it is true she is gifted there. Her value is much deeper and purer.

God will, undoubtedly, use you to bring freedom to the captives. Men and women alike.

I was deeply moved by your paper, and the heart behind it.

Thank you for sharing it with me.