Farewell Noble Spirit of the Enlightenment

Approaching the End of Patriarchy?

Have we, in the final analysis, simply cloaked prior eons of chaos, darkness and base instinct with a veneer of sophistication? Have a few bold, courageous new ideas about reality a few centuries back, augmented with enormous natural resource and energy sources, blinded us to those lurking reactive forces?

If again back in thrall to those lesser impulses, are we, at best then, a clumsy work in progress? A dubious link between the human and the truly humane and a messy bit of unfinished celestial business pretending all is well with us.

Dorinda Outram:

"Enlightenment was a desire for human affairs to be guided by rationality rather than by faith, superstition, or revelation; a belief in the power of human reason to change society and liberate the individual from the restraints of custom or arbitrary authority; all backed up by a world view increasingly validated by science rather than by religion or tradition."

In ever increasing areas of the world are not critical signs pointing to a rapid reversion to a earlier mode of existence? For a few centuries now, easing of daily existence, along with greater material resources, has been followed by vastly greater fecundity that permeates even remote areas. But lately the very planet seems to be complaining that for centuries we, it's self-proclaimed stewards, have not acted wisely. As the privileged species, it seems to say, our housekeeping is atrocious; the place is a mess. Clean it up!

We have degraded, polluted, over-populated and taken up vastly more than our share of all that exists here. It has never been worse and that is because never before have we been able to take so much, so quickly, for use in the present; denying it to the future. Our legacy to the heirs, writ clearly and proudly, is, "You shall have nothing if we can help it. We are spending your Planet; go somewhere else. Maybe we'll overlook and leave behind something useful, something that doesn't take powerful machines to bring forth; that's doubtful. You will, future persons, if you are lucky, become scavengers, salvagers and junkmen, because we will leave plenty of that."

Apparently it will not be outer space to which we will then go, as many have dreamed. Like moths to a bulb we have risen grandly to the heights but also like the moth we grow exhausted (and broke) and succumb to gravity. ( America has difficulty even delivering the daily mail lately.)

On some level, mostly subconscious at this point in time, Westerners know the game is up. That the powers that be are not leveling with us. The information sneaks in stealthily that everything is different from what we are told. That things will not be returning to what we've known in the past... ever.

All sorts are wild and bizarre statements and actions will be the new norm for the nonce. Without information free from spin and slant people will thrash around for guidance and direction. A lot of this will be frightening for many, certainly unpleasant, but not unexpected after several generations of disinformation serving as truth. Anything we are told these days, particularly on the very best authority, best forget it and keep digging around. Somewhere beyond the noise is the truth.

Carl Jung cautioned that if we did not soon find a universal understanding of what makes us human the future looked dim. That perhaps we will see a gradual collapse of our material way of life and enter into a time comparable to the Dark Ages. The failure to examine in depth the actual nature of reality as opposed to the arbitrary hunches and dogmas currently in vogue fail to ground mankind within nature and the scheme of things. In no regard are we meeting the future united, prepared and in agreement on what we really are and what we really need. If we couldn't fix things during good times, how on Earth will we do it now?

Part of our own dilemma stems from devotion to a aggressive, militant fundamentalism. For decades our principal activity has been the outfitting of legions of missionaries (armed to the teeth of course) setting out bravely to convert the unwashed, the unbelieving and the disrespectful, hopefully at a profit. With missions in hundreds of bases everywhere our brand of Americanism and Christian fundamentalism has alarmed the world. But as Professor Chomsky reminds us, it did all begin here. We do own it.

Noam Chomsky:" We must bear in mind that the US is a very fundamentalist society, perhaps more than any other society in the world - even more fundamentalist than Saudi Arabia or the Taliban. That's very surprising."

"Until 1950, there was no entry for fundamentalism in the Oxford English Dictionary; the derivative fundamentalist was added only in its second 1989 edition." Wikipedia

We also learn these inventions, spawned early in the Twentieth Century by fledgling Divines and Dons, at Princeton Theological Seminary, were social skirmishes whose time had come. The creators were ambitious and zealous: to defend orthodox Protestant Christianity against the perceived threat of Darwinism and liberal theology. Sound familiar?

"The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie, deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic."
John F. Kennedy

Naturally our militaristic minions around the world have not gone unnoticed by the locals. Religious zealotry begets more of the same and lately half the globe is seething with it. Thus far, the second - stringers, the so-called BRICs, have not caught the plague. Not yet. But then it's the fifties in China and we all know where that era led elsewhere. The Middle Kingdom version is sort of the equivalent of hundreds of Levittowns being thrown up against a background of Berlin in the nineties replete with construction cranes to the horizon. And, oh yes, a political regime resembling the hairy hand of McCarthyism we all enjoyed so much.

A Beijing Scenario:

It's the fifties in the Middle Kingdom and the cruisin' has begun. Picture this scene out of "Chinese Graffiti" where forty million single dudes in spanking new SUVs cruise endlessly trying to pick-up, get this, NO chicks! Now that they produce more cars than the US the bumper stickers could shout, "What's Good for Great Wall Motors is Good for China!" Fifty years of 'one childness' has produced a bumper crop of ...testosterone.

Good luck with that!

All in all, the old guys who run things in Beijing should look around the world, especially in the West, to see where all this 'progress' might lead. Instead of benefiting from seeing where we stumbled they seem determined to end up the same way, broke, confused and angry. Nobody ever learns, it's our charm as a species and may bury us yet.

Now males, and especially older males, have much to offer but they really should be regarded as useful idiots. Aside from certain mental qualities that enable them to stand slightly aside from life's realities and do interesting things abstractedly, like build stuff and blow up stuff, they should never, ever, be allowed near the sources of power.

Two things, and only two, are commanded by nature: reproduction of species and death. All else is option. Males are largely indifferent to the former but appear much devoted to the latter.Too often the violent demise of some other male is a consuming focus of male effort. Now males are all right as far as we go but we have gone way too far for way too long. A thousand generations is quite enough as we, all of us, are now quite noticeably...stuck. We are stuck in the here and now; stuck in today.

The Earth has endured a thousand generations of male domination. Human life may one day soon be forfeit as a result. An innate lack of future orientation sufficient to overcome exploitation of the planet for temporal gain suggests males are unfit for continued leadership. Recorded history and mythology are testimony to the propensity of the gender to build, destroy, and kill with blatant disregard for future aspect. The male mindset that has been governing the globe lacks a clear future inclination and could lead the species to extinction if allowed to continue unabated

What to do? Well, the distaff, on the other hand, at least live from month to future month much of their lives; a big improvement over the male day- to- day plodding vision. And on occasion the femmes live several months out ahead; nine months out to be exact. In this way the future can be somewhat sensed as existing beyond now and beyond a single generation.

Is this then, a different way of viewing existence, of living along a different time line, what the human race sorely lacks as a lodestar? Orientation and planning with emphasis on the future rather than the temporal. Something that many females possess but which has been trivialized and disregarded in favor of what could be interpreted as male theft of the future for a specious patriarchy today.

There is likely no community on the planet where reversal or even lessening of current gender domination could take place in any meaningful way. In fact billions of people are expressly forbidden by theology to even contemplate such a transition. An advocacy of this notion might lead to excommunication, stoning, beheading or at least a banishment to the nearest desert for the audacity. Most theologies consist of many small truths cobbled together as one big lie; male supremacy.

So an arrangement that could possibly save the species from itself will have to await a post apocalyptic time. Not an ounce of power will be willingly ceded until civilization crashes around us. Why then is the example of a society which managed to exist far longer than any other known, and with near equal female participation; the three thousand year track record of Ancient and Pharaonic Egypt ignored as pagan and effeminate? Because it's better to risk total cataclysm and perish than to have them running the show!

Perhaps It all started after the last ice age. The hunters hunted and the gatherers gathered. Then the gatherers became diggers and, eureka!, agriculture. Thank's ladies! This was the real deal: civilization. Not the hobby-shop, toy and gadget world the now underemployed hunter bunch dreamed up. No this was what made it all happen. Full bellies and some leisure time courtesy of the femmes. But the gals let their lead slip away and the hobby-shop became the world.

What kind of a future will they make for us if women regain the leadership? What it won't be is the hobby-shop, gadget and garage-band world;that city center/phallic oases guy's world, repete with extraordinary violence, it has been for generations. It will, early on, necessarily revert to the most basic of basics, growing stuff to eat, full tilt.

Restaurateur and Chef Jose Andreas of 'Julio' in Bethesda, Maryland was interviewed recently on NPR radio and made the most profound energy statement I have heard in years.



"But I think the most important is to remind everyone that the most important source of energy is not gas. The most important source of energy is food, because food is what keeps us - the humans - with energy. So we need to start thinking about food as the most important source of energy, because it's the energy that keeps moving us, the people - the people of America, the people of world.

... I hope that we're going to start taking seriously where our food comes from. Because right now I don't think we do. And we need to start making sure that our politicians understand that the most important thing is our food, period. And food should be un-negotiable..."

We may become a tribe of earnest junkmen recycling gadgets and gee-gaws; eternally recycling for employment. The ladies just trying their best to keep the babies warm and healthy. All the while finding and setting priorities, including the amatory arrangements. If it doesn't appear to make sense unto the seventh generation it don't git done! And that's not negotiable, pal

The Roman Empire slid into the backwater of history without a whimper. Will we, the 'can do' people, the inventors of damn near everything, the flyers to the moon; will we do the same thing? Very likely. Unless things change in a big hurry, an historical backwater is our likely destination,too.

With even a tiny clear glimpse of our future prospects America could wake out of it's trance and begin to prepare. Slowly, very slowly, in all probability. Committees, of course, endless committees, but that's okay. As long as they are realistic and not simply bent on returning to what cannot be sustained any longer. Hopefully the message that emerges from all this collective wisdom will be...

Stop! Stop everything!

We're broke. We're losing irreplaceable energy supplies rapidly. We're despised globally for bringing it all down on everybody's head by sheer hubris, endless war, and willful interference on a massive, Crusader like, scale for a century or so. It's up to us, alone, if we intend to survive as a viable entity.

Where to start? Sensible priorities might help. The time has come for National Triage. It can't all be saved. So what's important? Food, clothing, shelter, fuel and transportation. What? That old stuff? Yep, exactly. That's were it's at.

Well, we can handle all that, we already do. Sure, but on credit, yours, mine and the government's; at the sufferance of others. Those days are ending rapidly. As a debtor nation and debtor society the barbarians can arrive at the gates any day in the form of creditors demanding payback. On that day it's all over. Backwater time for sure.

How do we keep the wolf at bay? Maybe by living for the future for a change. The future to a farmer means planting now for harvest later. It doesn't mean waiting by the dock for dinner to arrive from farmers thousands of miles away. It also means less crop planting dedicated to cow and hog (and automobile) gullets and more stuff that goes straight to human nourishment.

The future also would appreciate us saving a little something prior to its arrival. Like fossil fuel? If we made our own jeans, bath towels, footwear, etc.etc. ourselves (we did once, remember?) we could save a little petrol for the future. Might come in handy, who knows? We could use what we manage to save now to keep the lights on, the food cold and the house warm, down the road. And put a little aside to carry us comfortably around instead of needing to walk everywhere.

As we rapidly edge toward the end of a surfeit of cheap and plentiful energy based on the consumption of irreplaceable fossil fuel, a bitter ' historical' reality begins to present itself for our consideration.

For three centuries we have developed a growing dependence on highly concentrated forms of what is basically solar energy, sunlight, to ease our burdens and grow our societies. Before the general use of coal and later, petroleum, we were limited to hydro, wind, firewood and, if the hunting was good, whale oil, to help us. But what formed the basis of our walking around energy usage was horse,and human, muscle power.

Human power, beyond the personal and familial, was augmented by hired help and/or owned help. History is rife with doleful accounts of the later. In fact it was only in the 20th century that chattel slavery was finally abolished worldwide. Legal human slavery existed in the lifetime of a few elderly people still alive today.

How fantastic is a scenario predicated on the gradual lead-up to a condition of want and coercion that would lead one or more societies to consider reverting to that 'peculiar institution'? And if conditions had so deteriorated as to make the unthinkable attractive who would take the first step?

David Suzuki said "We must reinvent a future free of blinders so that we can choose from real options."

A resilient globe, Earth, having managed to absorb constant assaults on its integrity for eons is now beginning to show vulnerability. Human populations were not sufficiently numerous nor technologically advanced enough in the past to cause grievous planetary harm. This is no longer true. Every day we come closer to the point of no return and nowhere is seen the remedy for reversing possible terminal decline.

We are not unique, never were. We are not all good and wise and noble. Too many pictures, too many reports have surfaced of too many nasty deeds done in our name all over the place for too, damn long. Too much money sticking to the hands of too few of us and too many lies about why that is. Folks are not as ready as they once were to drink the cool-aid or believe the half-truths and absolute fictions ever so slyly promulgated; about why things need to be this way.

"Nothing will see us through the age we're entering but high consciousness, and that comes hard. We don't have a good, modern myth yet, and we need one."

Robert Johnson

None among us living or dead is really fit to be called humane. The best and noblest among us is but a passive enabler of a species given to denial of future entitlement in favor of present utility. Notice the ones in those pictures with swollen bellies and flies on their eyes are never the mothers. We husband the breeders; forfeit the young...the future.

Nukes=No Future

Nukes= No Future
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http://goo.gl/n1yrb

A Proclamation: Ex Cathedra

Stories About The Future - A submission for ADR

A Proclamation: Ex Cathedra
by Robert Magill

"It's better than just sitting here in the dark freezing", he grumped.
"We're not freezing. Don't be such a...", Margot sounded.
"Wuss", another.
"You're not gonna fall for that stupid billboard, are you?", Jeffery was incredulous.
"Or those crappy fliers?", she said.
Blake looked anew at the yellowish document he was holding. It was on low quality newsprint; all that was available recently. Still he was taken by the simplicity of the message and the threat of change in his life it proffered.

Your Planet Needs You to Volunteer
A Call For Volunteers

It went on to say more detailed information was forthcoming soon and that it would be an opportunity of a lifetime. Blake had spent his few short years avoiding volunteering for much of anything but the alleged source of the call both intrigued and annoyed him.

"Your Planet! Who would have the gall to even dream up such a scam...the chutzpah", he said to no one and everyone, " that gets me." Margo pulled her blanket layers more tightly around her. "Blake, you've got to be kidding. Anybody can see it's a come-on. Somebody want's something from us."

Jeffery, who was finishing up the last of his ration roared out with a mouthful. "Let's get off it, Ok. Enough!"

The four who were sharing the flat had little in common except the day-to- day idleness that was endemic all around. All their individual and collective energies were devoted to bare existence. The malaise these twenty-somethings were experiencing was nothing unusual in the latter part of the twenty-first century.

They had grown up constantly reminded to be thankful they lived in a part of the world where people could still have hope for better times and not the really wretched areas elsewhere. It was difficult to feel fortunate with winter setting in and knowing it was going to be another long grind until spring.

Since power had been off most of the day and never was on after nine PM they soon drifted off into fitful dozing.

Clark was slightly older than the others and woke with the pale October dawn. With effort he arose clutching his blankets about his tall, somewhat gangly, frame. They were all slightly gaunt now as rations were minimal. He made an effort to not even think about eating this early. When he had shaken off sleep remnants and wandered closer to the front of the flat, which may have been a squat (the guy who collected the modest rent seemed dicey, maybe not even entitled to it) but he kept a little heat on and they had to be content.

"Oh my lord, another one!" In the door jamb was another of the bills Blake had exclaimed over.

Your Planet Needs You to Volunteer
A Call For Volunteers
Your Planet is annoyed that a great many of you have for several centuries demonstrated a lack of the wise stewardship demanded of a privileged species. Your housekeeping is atrocious, the place is a mess.

Your Planet is concerned you have degraded, polluted, over-populated and used-up more than your share of all that exists here.

Your Planet is greatly annoyed your actions have heated up the place to such a degree the New Ice Age planned to cool things off and rearrange the landscape may have been delayed.

"What crapola!, he shouted, having read this much. This was loud enough to awaken Margot and a sullen Jeffery. "What are you raving about. God it's cold", she complained.
"Here, dig this", handing over the form. They read on.

In order to expedite the ensuing decline of modern civilization and prevent an unseemly last minute rush to annihilation: an appeal is hereby issued as follows;

_ Volunteer now because an orderly "Planetary Die-off" to sustainable numbers is
desirable to avoid overtaxing existing funerary facilities: therefore;

*All First World inhabitants are requested to volunteer early as your impact on
Planet Earth is the most dire and your passing will no doubt be histrionic and
trying for the rest of mankind. Your Planet knows who you are.


They cried in unison at this point. "First World! What is this shit? We live in a slum and eat MRE's and K-rations when we can get them." First World, ha!"

The rancor woke up Blake who grabbed the notice and devoured it greedily. He was much taken by this indictment of the only world he had ever known and reacted accordingly. "This is meant for all of us. It's not a joke. This is real."

"Real your ass", hissed Jeffery, taking the missile and shredding it."Get ready guys, forget this nonsense. We have to get down early to the dispensary if we want to eat tonight. They run out early this time of year."

The four bundled up against the late fall chill and left the flat. On the boulevard opposite the food dispensary a tattered old billboard featured a huge new poster that had appeared during the night. It was a repeat of the headlines contained in the two fliers but added much more. A small crowd had gathered around and they were stunned as they read the additional dictat.

In order to expedite the ensuing decline of modern civilization and prevent an unseemly last minute rush to annihilation: an appeal is hereby issued as follows;

_ Volunteer now because an orderly "Planetary Die-off" to sustainable numbers is
desirable to avoid overtaxing existing funerary facilities: therefore;

*All First World inhabitants are requested to volunteer early as your impact on
Planet Earth is the most dire and your passing will no doubt be histrionic and
trying for the rest of mankind. Your Planet knows who you are.


Exemptions:
1. Old Order (Horse & Buggy) Amish. Not part of modern life, therefore
exempt.
2. Vegans (closeted, or mum about it) who live above anticipated
flood zones worldwide and have demonstrable funerary skills.
3. Organic farmers who live in yurts, make their own clothing and use
plow horses. (No cattle, hogs or other slaughter animals permitted).


"Jesus, it's like the draft used to be in the war days. They have exemptions and we're not included", protested Blake,"That's not fair."

"Blake, you are a flake, it's a hoax. Don't you get it? It's not Big Brother, it's Big Scammer!", Jeffery pronounced with some heat but, nevertheless, some anxiety.

The crowd moved into the food line with muttering and resignation. "What does it mean", from someone. "Can't you read. It's God's will.", we're all goners, now." "Bull! Bull! Bull!", from a doubter.

The friends talked among themselves as they withstood the long wait for their food dole. Their normally dour mood was much augmented by the pronouncements on the poster. With the rations in hand they wandered about the area aimlessly until fatigue and ennui reluctantly propelled them homeward.

Arriving at the flat they were astounded to see another of the odious papers affixed to the front door. The four stared without touching the notice.

Final Notice: PROCLAMATION: Ex Cathedra


Your Planet Will Consider Additional Exemptions for Early Volunteers if They Meet These Requirements:


_Volunteer cowboys and hog wranglers needed in great numbers to supervise the
decline of those populations to practically nil, as quickly and humanely as possible.
Your Planet is choking on their effluence

_Volunteer Urban Futurists to supervise and expedite gradual evacuation of urban centers (first priority to those in flood plains) to densities not to exceed that of, example only, Peoria, Illinois.

_ Volunteer Flotillas to sail the globe rescuing military personnel abandoned at 750 bases when the government defaults and flees. (Contribution of personal
watercraft appreciated.)

_ Volunteer engineers and technicians: mechanical, electrical and especially nuclear to disable, dismantle and permanently mothball all nuclear devices and machines.
Without the resources needed to keep these applications adequately serviced and
maintained they are too dangerous to allow to exist.
Your Planet is made extremely nervous by these devices.


_Volunteer Secular (requirement, there will be a test) Missionaries to Third World (and possibly Second World) societies to prepare them for the shock of the demise of the First World and its bounty.
( For example: See Cargo Cult mentality.)
Additional Exemption:
1. Temporary delay of "Die-off"in under-developed world;
pending satisfactory results from First World "transitions".
Automatic revocation for Planetary Insult ( i.e. behaving like First World). Your Planet will be watching closely.

They tore off the paper, carried it inside and began to inventory their collective and solitary skills in light of the exemption possibilities. Hope flickered.

end

In the Shadow of Mount Trashmore

' INVASION OF THE SPACE BATS ' entry

In the Shadow of Mount Trashmore
by Robert Magill

"Five"
"Five"
"Seven"
"Way too many. Way, way too many", from an angry voice.
"That's nonsense. Make it twenty", another.
"You're bitter!', someone cried.
The meeting, one of several held to determine the final ratio, had been proceeding well enough until the call for floor suggestions. Now the rancor and dispute threatened to overshadow whatever progress had been enjoyed thus far.

"We need a break. This subject is draining us all.", Myra suggested in an effort to diffuse the rising heat this topic had engendered. She was senior enough to convince the women to pause and a dash from the circle to the toilets resulted.

No one was thrilled at the meeting theme and it had been put off numerous times. Circumstances had made it no longer possible to delay further. What was finally decided now would have lasting repercussions for generations. It could not be taken lightly.
After a short interval they began to gather again and hands were raised for attention. No leader was designated so by default certain speakers had arisen from the ranks. Among these was a slender, rather intense youngster who had impressed the gathering earlier. She was singled out from the throng of hands waving wildly.

"Miriam, go ahead please." Myra said at last.
"I'm younger than most of you so I feel what is decided here could affect me longer and I frankly am scared and nervous at this point. I haven't tried to have children yet and the prospect of what I fear may be a disgusting situation terrifies me,", she confessed.
"You'll love it, honey!, someone opined.
"Can it, we have to make a decision", rang out.
"They won't call you a slut or a whore like they did in my grandmother's day, kiddo", said an older woman.
"You're not the only one affected, missy", another hissed, before Myra could regain some order.

Myra turned to Miriam and smiled slightly to show her sympathy for what was not just the fears of the younger members but had affected them all.
"Agreement was unanimous at all earlier points as you know. I don't have to tell you I know this is one of the most difficult parts of the entire project. But it's crucial. So let's get it done", she said. "We're down to a choice between five or seven. How about a show of hands? Seven"
A great many hands went up but it was obvious it would not carry. "Five." It carried and except for a few disgruntled looks those gathered seemed relieved a decision had been made at long last.
"That'll show them we mean it. Smug bastards needed this to happen", was voiced.

Rising with notes in hand from her place on Myra's left Catherine waited while the murmurring subsided before commencing. In her precise shy tone she began. "A Manifesto. The Hopeful Remnants hereby agree", at this point several women yelled out at once,
"Not yet decided"
"I hate that name!"
"It's stupid. Change it!"
Myra interrupted the hubbub and pleaded,"If we can't continue, all our efforts will have been for nothing. Let Catherine go on...please."
Catherine began again. "The Hopeful Remnants hereby agree we will seek to limit the number of male citizens to one for each five females effective at once."
"Hear, hear"
"At last an end to it all"
"Sic semper tyrannosaurus!", blurted a wag which prompted a few snickers and much relief.

She went on. "Because we, The Hopeful Remnants, having concluded that past male leadership failed to perceive the objective environment was deteriorating beyond all hope of recovery and having persisted in causing ever more chaos and violence globally, we hereby unanimously agree that sort of coercive leadership shall never be permitted again. The state we have found ourselves in, though desperate is not hopeless ...unless we allow that gender to rule the world as it once did."
"No chance in hell!"
"Over my dead tush they will!"
"Men are swine!", was shouted.
"We rule now. Woop. Woop!"

Catherine continued hesitantly. "The great loss we suffered by this flagrant denial of looming fossil fuel shortages and the impossiblity of their replacement with anything that could provide for the sustainability of such a bloated life style led to the massive failure of all systems. The mostly male leadership knew this would occur to a certainty but chose to ignore for political or monetary gain doomsday looming on the horizon. The result of this tragic waste of basic energy resources is that no important manufactory has been possible for us since early in the twenty-second century. We have been fortunate to live near what used to be known by early residents as Mount Trashmore,"
"No big male bobble heads on our mountain!", was quipped.
... she smiles, then continues," and that huge old landfill keeps us reasonably well provisioned. It is a treasure trove for us as is quarrying in abandoned cities and towns for others who...

"It helps that our soil is tilth and easily worked", rang out.
"Keep the guys digging out old Trashmore..."
"...and out of our fields, our crops and our hair!"
"Unless it's comb-out time, kids. Ha."

"...are not fortunate enough to live in such a bucolic setting and have sustainable agriculture. In addition, it has long been our overriding effort to encourage a practice which, so far, seems to regularly produce more female than male babies and, is done without causing harm, and which, furthermore, serves to replace the mate exclusivity and more sinister practices that had favored male offspring. History is rife with female infanticide, one-child only rules and oppressive dowry requirements. Multiple partnering of several males with one female, as a prevailing social norm, was extremely rare historically. It is a tenet of our clan lore that the dominance of males throughout history was partially the result of insistence on singularity in couplings thus shunning competition.This bias may have gone far in accomplishing male dominion, both numerical and social, where it might not otherwise have flourished. Plus, grouped lovemaking is our way of avoiding favoritism, which although it still exists with us, usually does not lead to extreme possessiveness. By removing stigma and coercion from human sexual behavior. a more harmonious libido has fore-sworn most sexual compulsion while adding untrammeled eroticism to our daily fare."
"Untrammeled, that's us!"
"Yeeah!"
"You go ladies!"
"Hush!", Myra felt compelled to caution again.

"Our burgeoning bisexuality coexisting with a benign matriarchy has had an added benefit, the numbers of offspring always being a concern with us; a form of birth control. As we've discovered studying Bonobo ape populations, a surplus of sex can result in fewer offspring. This has the desired effects of strengthening bonds, providing pleasure and discouraging rivalries.
Most importantly, it reflects the latent sensual nature of contemporary females who have grown to maturity with an instinctive knowledge of self-worth and desire without the need for male approbation." Catherine lowered her notes and summed up with,"That's what we have so far, people. I'll be happy to add whatever additions or amendments we come up with."

Myra announced the end of the formal session and small groups gathered to compare the findings.
She was immediately approached by several of the younger members who excitedly peppered her with questions.

"I just don't get it."
"Neither do I", echoed Miriam rushing up. "What about us. Don't we count as individuals...or anything?"

"Believe me I know what you're going through ladies. I was your age once, you know. We've all been through it", explained Myra. " Something in our makeup cries out for it at a certain time in our lives. So the urge for exclusivity...they called it romance back in the day, is compelling."

"But I feel so complete, so special with him", it was Miriam on the verge of tears.

"I know my dear. It hurts so. But it will pass, and soon. That was one of the most insidious weapons...your vulnerability at this time of life, they used against us to keep the power", Myra said with compassion. "Films and books, Romance Novels, they were called, reeked of this.
An onslaught of sentimentality which kept young women forever longing for the one and only who would fill their hearts...and minds. It bred chronic discontent and impatience with anything less than what some writer's sentimental dreaming's had provoked within them."

Angie, who had hitherto remained silent tossed her hair back and issued a challenge."Do what you want. Listen to her if you haven't the guts to question. I want to know what the hell the shape of my Carlos' thingee got to do with all of this?"

That outburst caused a lot of giggles but got everyone's rapt attention.

"It's not just your guy's thingee, sweetie, it's all the guys...all males. Remember your anatomy lessions?"
"Gross!"
"Well some of it may have been. I can't quote it exactly but...it touched on how natural selection equipped men to handle other men impregnating their sexual partners and"

"Organ shape!"
"...you do remember that. Unforgettable, eh? I think it said 'the coronal ridge offers a special removal service to expunge foreign sperm'. Scientific American, that's what was quoted, I'm positive. In an old, old archive. To our bright gal researchers that was the clue. What was intended by nature but suborned for eons in favor of exclusivity in mating and control of women as chattel."
"We'd still be if they had their way", Miriam interjected.
"True! True! True", came back
"Are they even educable? I don't think so."

Myra continued, "Years ago, the clan's senior women were stunned by the idea of this organ being something so unique; and by the singular investment nature had made in sculpting it. And how, mankind so, how can I put it, so beneficently gifted by nature, had ignored until now the obviously intended usage. Awed by such prescience in nature, this information then gradually morphed into our clan lore and practice and remains so today .Not solely to prevent rivals from copulatory success but to alter the male to female ratio radically, maybe permanently."

"But Carlos and I just want to be in love", Angie pleaded.

"Of course you do. Be in love, make love, with Carlos or Miriam or anyone you choose. You miss the point, dear. Look, it's taken almost two centuries to get the ratio of women to men to where it is now. Between one and a half and two, to one, our favor. That's good but not nearly good enough. Still it's a lot better than about 50-50 as it was in the bad old days. And the paternity decision doesn't affect you or any of us unless..."

"We want to have a baby.", muttered Angie.
"...exactly. Then you must have multiple partners. Carlos will understand. Guys do...usually. Once in a while there's a cropper but hey...it's rough on some people. Especially if they have a tendency to be possessive."


"So how do we know this actually works? That it's not just a statistical thing...a freak of nature. We've only been doing it this way for a really short time", said another.
Myra, wearily,"We don't. But so far it seems solid. And so far we are able to keep them from getting the upper hand over us, though they try hard enough!"
"Do they ever! It's like a disease they all have", was advanced by another.
"The guys seem stuck, stuck in the here and now. Women have a more developed sense of time or something" offered Corrine, one of the new comers to the little group.
"Yeah, our future is always a month away, and another month, on and on", Angie griped.
"Well, if you're pregnant the future is many months down the road, nine, to be exact", put in Miriam.

"Myra, I know a lot of it has to do wih the way it's shaped, the head and all. But what really happens, you know, when you do it with a bunch of guys?", Angie was still puzzled.
"Well, when the male thrusts forcefully the other men's semen is sort of pulled up by the glans and away from your cervix so his seed has a better change", she replied.
"So how does that make girl babies?"
"Good question, kiddo. What seems to happen is this technique somehow favors girl seed and not the sperm for making boys. How? Who knows. But history was written by men and directed by men, so maybe sex selection was a part of the plan from way back. There has to have been a darn good reason for nature to take the trouble to perfect a device like the human male organ if it was not expected to be used as a scoop and without multiple partners expected to be regularly involved, what's there to scoop. What other use could have been intended? You tell me.", Myra sighed, beginning to wilt from the effort.

"All this makes me feel like part of an experiment and not very important part either", Angie complained bitterly. " A cross between a brood mare and a test tube. Is there any purpose to it all...to life?"

"Just two things, my sweet. Just two. and we've touched on one. Granted our task is difficult. The planet is not the oasis it once was. We know our hold is tenuous but we carry on. As for the reasons to exist, reproducing yourself is one; dying, the other. Everything else is an option. No, I'm wrong. There's a third. To keep the men from running amok and screwing up the planet again.
Let's break it off now, girls. Holding love and light to you all."

Myra left them and took a position in the center and to remind the gathering of the next stage.

"People. Keep in mind the next Plenary theme is a doozy. Got to face it though. If we intend, as we certainly do, to take charge of our lives and the destiny of the clan...and all the members. Female and male. We have to reach down and summon the courage to begin the discussion. So, as hard as it will be, ladies, next time we meet the agenda will be Death and Dying. How our clan is handling things, what improvements are needed and what is lacking. Big, big issues. That's about it for this afternoon, folks. Thanks for all your help. Blessed be. Oh, I don't have to tell you...keep it to yourselves. We don't need any company!"
end

Better dead than fem?

A resilient globe, Earth, having managed to absorb constant assaults on its integrity for eons is now beginning to show vulnerability. Human populations were not sufficiently numerous nor technologically advanced enough in the past to cause grievous planetary harm. This is no longer true. Every day we come closer to the point of no return and nowhere is seen the remedy for reversing possible terminal decline.

Two things, and only two, are commanded by nature: reproduction of species and death. All else is option. Males are largely indifferent to the former but appear much devoted to the latter.Too often the violent demise of some other male is a consuming focus of male effort. Now males are all right as far as we go but we have gone way too far for way too long. A thousand generations is quite enough as we, all of us, are now quite noticeably...stuck. We are stuck in the here and now; stuck in today.

The Earth has endured a thousand generations of male domination. Human life may one day soon be forfeit as a result. An innate lack of future orientation sufficient to overcome exploitation of the planet for temporal gain suggests males are unfit for continued leadership. Recorded history and mythology are testimony to the propensity of the gender to build, destroy, and kill with blatant disregard for future aspect. The male mindset that has been governing the globe lacks a clear future inclination and could lead the species to extinction if allowed to continue unabated

What to do? Well, the distaff, on the other hand, at least live from month to future month much of their lives; a big improvement over the male day- to- day plodding vision. And on occasion the femmes live several months out ahead; nine months out to be exact. In this way the future can be somewhat sensed as existing beyond now and beyond a single generation.

Is this then, a different way of viewing existence, of living along a different time line, what the human race sorely lacks? Orientation and planning with emphasis on the future rather than the temporal. Something that most females possess but which has been trivialized and disregarded in favor of what could be interpreted as male theft of the future for a specious patriarchy today.

There is likely no community on the planet where reversal or even lessening of current gender domination could take place in any meaningful way. In fact billions of people are expressly forbidden by theology to even contemplate such a transition. An advocacy of this notion might lead to excommunication, stoning, beheading or at least a banishment to the nearest desert for the audacity.

So an arrangement that could possibly save the species from itself will have to await a post apocalyptic time. Not an ounce of power will be willingly ceded until civilization crashes around us. The example of a society which thrived far longer than any other known, with near equal female participation, the three thousand year track record of Ancient and Pharaonic Egypt is ignored as pagan and effeminate. Better to risk total cataclysm than to have them running the show.