rambling reply not posted on someone else's blog

link (I'm not finished editing this, but gonna post it now regardless. Check back, it may change drastically before the day is over...)

hm... you all know my story by now? DD1 - incredibly highly managed pregnancy, c-section (not necessary, IMO, rather made necessary because of doctor intervention), unable to breastfeed, FTT, blah blah blah... okay, bear with me, this ties in to a deeper issue. I had no faith at all in myself, everything worked against me to not trust myself or my body to do anything right.
why is it that DD2 was born naturally, breastfed no problem, and now I'm unschooling both girls? It's because of what happened with DD1's horrible birth. My heart was screaming at me, telling me she was okay. I chose not to listen to my gut and placed my trust in the doctors and nurses instead. Look where that got me! They used my own fears against me, in order to force me to obey.

Here's what I think the deal is. We are being abused whenever any authority figure places a higher importance on what they want us to do than on what we know deep down inside is right. What happens when people are abused? Either they lay down and take it, somehow convince themselves they want it that way, or they fight back. I was pushed too far and I fought back (everyone has their own breaking point). I think most people will someday stop taking it, start trusting their instincts, and fight for what they know, deep in their hearts, to be right. They have to, else the human race is doomed.

I don't think it's men vs. women. I think that's another way to keep us fighting amongst ourselves rather than working together to make the world a better place. Okay, bear with me... going back to your original post... way back around 400bce Plato wrote in his Republic that public education was one of the best ways for those in power to ensure that they would remain in power. we have been trained all our lives never to question authority, and to not believe in ourselves. It just so happens that the authority has usually rested in the hands of abusive men. Our social structure, our organized religions, have all served to enable men to abuse women, but the men are not the enemy, the established order of things which creates this system of abuse is at the root of the problem.

History continues to repeat itself over and over again, everywhere you look. Anyone who tries to tell us to believe in ourselves, to trust our hearts or our instincts is ostracized, ridiculed, and/or murdered by the authorities. It's all part of a much bigger picture, but the solution is simple. We need to replace our faith in those authorities with faith in ourselves. But first we need to recognize that it is our own fear that allows them to control us. People are not the enemy, no matter what they say or do, FEAR is the real enemy we should all be working together to fight!!