{"id":1262,"date":"2013-08-12T13:53:00","date_gmt":"2013-08-12T13:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2013\/08\/on-fasting-and-feminism.html"},"modified":"2013-08-12T13:53:00","modified_gmt":"2013-08-12T13:53:00","slug":"on-fasting-and-feminism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2013\/08\/on-fasting-and-feminism.html","title":{"rendered":"On Fasting and Feminism"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>
On July 16th<\/sup>, I fasted for\u00a0Tisha b\u2019Av<\/a>, when Jews commemorate the destructions of the temples in Jerusalem among other events.\u00a0 On July 23rd<\/sup>\u00a0I attended, as a member of\u00a0GLILA,<\/a>\u00a0i<\/em>ftar,<\/i>hosted by the Tolerance and Dialogue Student Association of UMass Lowell.\u00a0\u00a0Iftar<\/i><\/a>\u00a0is the traditional nightly break-fast dinner during the month of Ramadan. \u00a0On Saturday, July 27th<\/sup>, I read in the\u00a0Boston Globe<\/em>\u00a0an obituary of a sixteen-year-old girl who lost her battle with\u00a0anorexia nervosa<\/i>.\u00a0 That small paragraph obituary gave me pause.\u00a0 I have literally spent this last month steeped in mine or my friends\u2019 religious practices of fasting.\u00a0 That young woman spent much of her last years of her life fasting to the point of death.\u00a0\u00a0 How does a religious feminist respond?<\/span><\/div>\n
Religious fasts regularly praise the virtues of self-denial and self-sacrifice.\u00a0 Abstention from food is thought to be spiritually purifying.\u00a0 The theology of fasting frequently seeks to humble the adherent in which the practitioner seeks to garner favor or be seen as worthy in the eyes of the divine.\u00a0 Fasting, especially in Christianity, also separates body and mind.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
From the denial of embodiment to the problematic nature of self-sacrifice, feminists have long spoken out against these theologies.\u00a0 Yet, the feminist movement has used hunger strikes, a form of fasting, in protest for decades.\u00a0 In May and June of 1982, seven women went on a\u00a0hunger strike in Illinois\u2019 capital building<\/a>\u00a0in an attempt to persuade Illinois to ratify the ERA, Equal Rights Amendment.\u00a0 During the suffrage movement, women imprisoned in\u00a0the Occoquan Workhouse went on a hunger strike\u00a0<\/a>as well.\u00a0 They said of themselves, \u201cAll the officers here know we are making this hunger strike that women fighting for liberty may be considered political prisoners; we\u00a0have told them. God knows we don\u2019t want other women ever to have to do this over again.\u201d\u00a0 On July 24th<\/sup>,everydayfeminism.com<\/a>\u00a0urged feminists to support and the hunger strike of Californian inmates seeking rights including adequate and nutritious food, restrictions on the use of solitary confinement, the end of group punishments and more.<\/span><\/div>\n
Read the rest here<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On July 16th, I fasted for\u00a0Tisha b\u2019Av, when Jews commemorate the destructions of the temples in Jerusalem among other events.\u00a0 On July 23rd\u00a0I attended, as a member of\u00a0GLILA,\u00a0iftar,hosted by the Tolerance and Dialogue Student Association of UMass Lowell.\u00a0\u00a0Iftar\u00a0is the traditional nightly break-fast dinner during the month of Ramadan. \u00a0On Saturday, July 27th, I read in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nOn Fasting and Feminism<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"On July 16th, I fasted for Tisha b\u2019Av, when Jews commemorate the destructions of the temples in Jerusalem among other events.  On July\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" 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