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"MASTER OF MY DOMAIN"
This title should conjure up a hilarious episode for all the fans of the Seinfeld sitcom. Jerry and friends had entered into a bet as to who could hold out the longest without masturbating. Master of one's domain meant one was still in control.
On the World Wide Web, a "domain name" may be purchased which specifically refers to you, your name or your business. For example <Amazon.com>. Some people name their sites after themselves for ego or to seek an increase in name recognition.
Politicians never lack ego and are eager for any vehicle that will spread their name and message around. Recently, some of them got caught by the short hairs because they did not think to reserve domain names or manage to buy them from e-entrepreneurs who sniffed the political winds early and snapped up some good domain name investments.
Steve Forbes, Hillary Clinton and Al Gore, among others, anted up beaucoup bucks to buy their preferred names back from the e-speculators and became masters of THEIR domain. However, there are still plenty of look alike domain names out there ready to confuse or amuse you and the browser you ride in on.
All of this might have lain quietly unheralded except for the fact that the guy that owned the domain name <gwbush.org> or <gwbush.com> refused to sell it to the W. campaign. To add insult to injury, if you try any of the following URLs, you WILL get his "official" site. <Bushsucks.com> <Bushbites.com> <Bushblows.com>
W. became so angry that he made some intemperate remarks about curbing internet freedom by pressing for the government to regulate political web sites. Well, not a great way to win friends and influence people. But we do sorta understand. It is HIS NAME and stuff he would rather not have seen is going out to the world under it!
So if you go to the gwbush URL, you'll find a lot of funny and serious stuff -- not much of which the Bush campaign wants out there. There are also links to other sources of information. In addition, there are some links not too friendly to Al Gore with domain names such as Allbore or Agore etc.
Come right down to it, OUR names ARE important to all of us one way or another. It is one of the first things we hear as babies, a confirmation that we ARE and that we have something that belongs to us. Yet for centuries, and even today, women are expected, conditioned and encouraged to give their name up at marriage and take the name given to all married women -- MRS.
Wouldn't you think that loss of domain might tend to alienate a woman; to hurl her from her personhood and self respect into the abyss of conformity? Not at all, say the family virtues folk who have sustained this custom. They consider that marriage is the ONLY way a woman can be happy.
They
also say that abortion makes all women who use it, unhappy and distraught
and that all gays and lesbians are unhappy, prone to illness and despair.
The reason they give is that the bible sez it is wrong and such actions
alienate them from the true religion. Well, hot damn -- just like
marriage.
But there is more to it for women than just losing our identity. Even those who retain their given name are still weighted down with the massive cloak of custom. Perhaps we all have, at times, used custom and conformity to mask our insecurity and non-personness.
CUSTOM! What do we go through in thy name and what do we miss of life in slavish worship at your alter? Remember our last article and the quote from a woman who watched T.V. and discovered that: "Women leak, dribble, and smell" etc.
Not a pretty picture, but are we women doing anything to change it? Do we even want to? A subscriber sent us the following comment:
"I have great sympathy, empathy even, for the situation that the women of America face. But if they want the situation to change, they must first vote with their conscience, then their dollars!!! If you don't WANT to be portrayed as smelly, or dandruff-ridden, or overweight, then you need to have a chat with the corporations whose brands you buy. Ask them for their marketing executives and shout at THEM." (Thanks, Brooke)
William Wordsworth weighs in on the theme of alienation and recovery with this advice (read it out loud, it does both soul and body good):
The world is too
much with us; late and soon
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.--Great God!
I'd rather be A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn."
Those of us who still pursue equality and respect and self-definition for ALL women have found our domain name, WOMAN, usurped by right-wing fembots and we are left with the media contrived *F* word-ist plus bitch, troublemaker and a host of other pejorative titles that are meant to alienate us from our gender.
How much more than our domain name have WE allowed others to take from us?
1999-037
Copyright 1999 Renee T. Louise and Ruth M. Sprague, Ph.D. These articles may be republished for noncommercial use only, provided that they are copied intact, and that this copyright notice is attached. Address all queries to: twanda@ConnRiver.net.
G e n d e r G a p p e r s T M
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