Recent archeological findings tell us that there was a time when women and men worshipped the Great Goddess, the Earth Mother, and when images of the creative and fecund female were carved into stone and treasured. 1 As far as we can tell, about 5,000 years ago, militaristic groups from the Middle East began invading the peaceful, agrarian, Goddess-worshipping societies, beginning a long-term swing on the pendulum of human history. As the pendulum swung away from the Goddess and toward male- oriented values, it seems that the position of women in society became progressively worse, and aspects of life relating to the female were denigrated.

Over time this led to an association of shame with the body (always associated with the female, the Goddess, the Earth, feelings, and sensations) relative to the mind (associated with the male, the God, the sky, the world of ideas). Over the past few thousand years, all the mainstream religions in the world have become patriarchal (to varying degrees) and all of them value the intellect and the spirit over the body and the instincts. The old knowledge persists in the esoteric branches of the world religions, but the mainstream is primarily mind and sky oriented. God lives up there, not in the Earth. And there is pretty much a global consensus that He is Male.

Iz: Lara Owen, HER BLOOD IS GOLD: AWAKENING TO THE WISDOM OF MENSTRUATION, 1993, HarperCollins.

Autorka je predavačica na Univerzitetu St. Endruz (University of St. Andrews, Škotska) i začetnica je tzv. menstrualnih studija. Kako kaže prof. dr Oven: usled savremene hrane bogate proteinima i hormonima, te činjenice da žene više ne umiru mlade & imaju manje dece u odnosu na naše pretkinje, danas se menstruira više nego ikad u ljudskoj istoriji. U ovoj studiji pojašnjava se (picrel) i da gađenje, sramljenje i tabuiziranje u vezi sa menstruacijom nije prirodno niti urođeno — nego je nastalo dugim i vrlo konkretnim antropološkim prevratima. Da i dalje živimo u matrijarhalnoj paleolitskoj kulturi Lepenskog Vira, uloške bi kupovali i delili naglas. Elem, zanimljiv mi je i ovaj autorkin navod iz knjige SEX IN HISTORY (Gordon Rattray Taylor, 1954, Ballantine Books):

[Menstrual] taboos were not common in European culture until the middle ages when Theodore, the author of influential medieval penitential (THEODORI POENITENTIALE), stated that it was a sin for a menstruating woman to enter a church, and he imposed a penance for infraction of this rule.

Nova knjiga Lare Oven izlazi za nekoliko dana, 30avg24: REORGANIZING MENSTRUATION: MENSTRUAL INNOVATIONS AND THE REDISTRIBUTION OF BOUNDARIES, CAPITALS AND LABOUR, Oxford University Press.