As a study of the European witch hunts will show, acts like these expose other layers of a society's values. From India come reports of higher caste men tormenting lower caste women; in a village of Tamil Nadu, for example, a ringle family of thevar (high-caste) men regularly raped the women of the harijan (untouchable) community. Much of this behavior has ancient roots, but as political upheaval has swept over India in the last forty years, public tensions have triggered even more violence against women, especially poor low-caste females. When Indian men feel pressured, they offen take it out on women, as did European men in the sixteenth century. The painful irony is that part of the increase in violence against women today comes as a reaction to Indian women's response to India's new democratic goals. As women have begun to assert themselves, they find themselves targets of increased male hatred and efforts at control. When faced with this new level of harassment, some women kill themselves; many more internalize the message that they are evil.



It should not surprise us that such a society is prey to outbreaks of witchcraft accusations. Among some Indian tribal groups-those who associate evil with women and who have a tradition of strong, even matriarchal rotes for women-witch hunts are an the increase. The women accused are mostly widows without children to support them. Because they have a life interest in lands that will pass at their death to their male relatives, they become targets of greed: by accusing them of witchcraft and having them stoned or beaten to death, those men inherit the land immediately. This persecution is part of a wide attack an women's traditional rights and part of a successful attempt to establish a patriarchal order, "an attempt to force women into a particular gender role." It is also a way to discredit women who have an inside track with the bongas (household spirits). We will see a similar pattern in the development of witch hunts in Europe, which occurred at a time when women's traditional roles as healers, prophets, and producers were under attack.



We have seen that this situation is not essentially different in the Western world today, and again, we must not be surprised that independent women are being named witches.




When Pat Robertson declared that supporting the Equal Rights Amendment was a "socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians," he drew an old combination of stereotypes hostile to women (emphasis added). Any woman who challenges the patriarchal order may be suspect.



Aus:
Anne Llewellyn Barstow, Witchcraze. A New Study Of The Eurepean Witch Hunts, Pandora c/o Harper Collins Publishers Limited, London 1994



Keywords:
Gender, Gendercoaching, Gender coaching, Gender-coaching, Wicca, Witch