Witches

Its that time of year.... lots of ghosts and goblins and Witches flying about. The way most witches are portrayed fall into 2 different camps of beliefs. One is the greeen faced, mishapen, hunchbacked evilly cackling witch or the very sexual perky witch. Either is how the church has seen women for centuries.. either old and haggish and cooking up all manner of evil brews OR a sex kitten just waiting to tempt a poor man who simply cant resist!!
But what is a witch really? A Wise Woman. A woman who has wisdom is always a threat to the church and to the government. If we think, then we can talk,,, and thus we can go against society. And this is NOT good according to those in charge.
Women burned as witches were healers, herbalists, midwives,older women with the ovaries to speak out against the church, widows with property that of course went to the church upon her death, women of money with no husband or if she had a husband and he didnt denounce her--then by golly he was a witch too.
The horrors and the pain of women tortured and burned should make us all pause this Samhain-Halloween month, and give a silent memorial to those women.
Let us honor witches. They were simply women like you and me...not evil and not sex starved, but simply strong wise women.
If we look around our culture we can still see the witch burnings. We can still see women being shut up, denigrated, harrassed, physically threatened, and all manner of pain. Standing up to a patriarchal society is not easy and never to be taken lightly.

All strong uppity women are witches.. and society will do its best to quiet them.