That reminds me of something a woman friend of mine said years ago. She was pretty good at chess, but her father was excellent, and she said the problem there is that men are wired to parry and attack, while women are wired to react and protect, to hold back, which is doom speak in the realm of chess. You are preprogrammed not only sexually and spiritually, but also intellectually, instead of choosing to live not on the prospect of fear, but self-empowerment.
That’s right. So in a way I think this record is attacking the way that sin was seeded and put in the psyche, generation after generation.
Which brings me to the lyric in ‘Flavor,’ ‘Who’s God then is God / They all want jurisdiction / In the book of Earth / Who’s God spread fear spread love.’ And there is also the stanza from the title track, ‘She may be dead to you / But her hips sway a natural kind of faith / (And I love the combination of physicality and spirituality here) That could give your lost heart / A warm chapel / You’ll sleep in her bell tower / And you will simply wake (Which has this Buddhist feel to it)’ I wonder, have you ever heard of Matilda Josyln Gage?
No.
The reason why I ask is your answer speaks to your point. She was a latter 19th century suffragette who was ostracized by the women’s movement and in particular Susan B. Anthony for her vociferous stance against the church and Christianity at large. The movement subjugated her because the movement could never be ingratiated into American politics on the momentum of an atheist or pagan voice, even though her points justified the very movement she was kicked out of. And in an essay at the time that I believe ended up in one of her later books, she wrote: “Believing this country to be a political and not a religious organization…the editor of the NATIONAL CITIZEN will use all her influence of voice and pen against ‘Sabbath Laws,’ the uses of the ‘Bible in School,’ and pre-eminently against an amendment which shall introduce ‘God in the Consitution.’” In a way she is saying that all of these concepts were set up as a retaining wall to keep women from their constitutional rights, and although it differs slightly to what you’ve been saying, I thought about Gage and this quote upon hearing much of Abnormally Attracted To Sin.
Well it’s funny that you bring this up, because I’ll be playing the Daughters Of The American Revolution in Washington soon at DAR Constitution Hall. (sighs) The thing is, yes, things have changed in many ways, but you probably know how corporations are rife with a Right Wing Christian kind of leaning. And that this is not just an isolated situation I’m talking about, but across the country there’s a movement that is really about subjugating women on every level. It’s everywhere. And yes, there are corporations that are thinking more like you and I, but the fact is that in the 21st century there are corporations that are driven by a belief system!
So the separation of church and state is a concept that is not necessarily a reality in our country at all. And I’ve had to go up against it as well; nothing like this woman, mainly because of the Internet, where I could get to the people without…(pauses) Without the Internet I’m not sure I’d be on my 10th album right now quite frankly, because the Internet came as corporations were clogging where I stood. And I was very vocal about the emancipation of all people, not just women, from this tyrannical faith system that is not Jesus’ teaching. So, yeah, I’ve had to combat some pretty dark forces. And without the Internet I don’t think that I would have been able to do it, because I got directly to the people.
Working outside of the system that is set up against free thought or free expression?
That’s right. But if we didn’t have the Internet we couldn’t work outside the system. Not like we are.
