456 - Living in a religious cult 6 - Gender edition

When I posted my first living in a religious cult entry, back in October 2017, I didn't anticipate the amount of extra content I'd add to what became a triple blog series, along those for the BITE model and its examples in my own experiences, which I'd called Being Bitten. Although I knew that I could never be fully exhaustive on the topic, I truly didn't imagine that 55 months later I'd add a sixth part to the initial series that started it all!

I will remind you that as often, multiple trigger warnings apply in this entry (abuse, domestic violence, religious trauma), and that after the page break, you'll have another 1789 words to read.

As the title indicated, my particular sub-topic today is that of Gender, or more specifically, how gender norms were presented to me as a grand scheme of the belief system that was forced upon me, from its macrocosm to my microcosm. 

This belief system included a not-so-original idea that (macrocosm) god isn't only male, but a duo of male and female deities, forming only one deity... Despite this apparent openness, this double deity didn't open up any field of personal expression as either or both genders, quite the contrary! 

Time for my microcosm... and my environment. 

This system came with a perverse toxicity that male (my father, the guru, the leader, the new-and-last savior on earth) still had to dominate female (my mother, my step-mother, women in general). This came with a lot of verbal and physical abuse throughout the years ; 

I only recall witnessing those words and actions towards my step-mother, with the systematic 'excuse' my father would always say about why he was being violent at her : he was being tested by the devil/satan/ the unnamed and unnamable evil, who spoke and acted through her, and it wasn't her nor her body that he was attacking, but him (aka the devil etc) ! 

Here, we see a pervasive form of misogyny, one where the supposed evil enters only women, and only to test the spiritual strength of the man, who is also god incarnate. 

Screaming, yelling and beating a woman thus possessed by the devil wasn't violence towards the woman, but the spiritual response to a spiritual attack by the devil, in his attempts to deny god incarnate and foil his plans to reunite a select believer humans with god... "I'm not doing anything wrong, you let the devil enter and I'm not punishing you, but him, but you're also at fault for letting him in, you sinner"...  

Thus, from a macrocosm of a dual-gendered deity presented to me as an ideal to reach, the violent words and acts, disguised as spiritual warfare, were contradictory in nature, and portrayed strife and domestic violence as acceptable ; and instead of battle of the sexes, it was described as evil's temptation of this omnipotent god, incarnated as his own son... incapable of being god, down here on earth, and having his resolve set on test from the devil... what image of gender does all that give you ? By default, that the 2 genders of this system are different from one another and are automatically at war. So, it's the image of violence, pure and simple. 

In an unsurprising move, each disciple of my father's had to comply to gender normative tasks and behaviors, and the idealized dual-gendered deity was one we had to strive towards, but could never achieve, because we were low, sinning, human souls, who could never reach this perfection... With all the guilt-tripping about it that you can imagine! 

As elsewhere, this cult's gender norms included attire, so what men and women could and couldn't wear were mutually exclusive - and of course, this was totally hetero-cis-normative, so no place for anything else. The only sorta dual gendered piece of clothing was the prayer outfit, which had the same markings. 

In details, women (step-mother and one of the disciples and any future ones), and girls (my half and step siblings) had to wear the so-called modest, feminine clothes, long dresses with long sleeves to cover any skin ; keep hair long as it was 'feminine' ; the women also had to wear the tichel, which is a scarf, to cover the head, as a sign of humility, diginity, and submission to the men. It shares aspects, but also differs in some respects, to head covering for jewish women - because judaism was only one of this cult's components in the religious soup. 

Men and boys had to wear the kippah, a brimless cap, in the same meanings as the tichel. Additionally, we had to let the beard grow - so when my grandfather, a barber by trade, had shaved my first beard growth when I reached puberty, my father (his son) lost it : he screamed at his own father for defacing me against our rules! (my grandfather and grandmother were non-practicing jews, not part of the cult, though my grandmother in particular was financially enabling). We had to display the jewish signs of a male, too : we had to wear the tallit, letting its tzitzit show (check this wiki) ; wear masculine clothes, trousers/pants (depending on your English version), also covering skin to curtail any attraction, as sexuality (the other component in gender roles) was only for procreation. 

Toys and gifts were a  very odd topic in this cult : on the one hand, they were deemed tamas (from hinduism) and mere materialism. Thus, they were forbidden. But, on the other hand, they were expected to be given, according to gender norms, and then confiscated... because of the aforementioned materialism... BUT, in practice, only mine were seized, whilst those of my younger half and step siblings were actually given. Go figure. 

The only activities that were suitable for all of us were those meant to bring us 'happiness of servicing god/my father/our leader' and also maintain our 'spiritual humility' were those of cooking and cleaning. 

As my father's "eldest son" , I was to be a role model to everyone else and perform all the gender roles to "humble imperfect perfection"... 

In this, I had to refrain from any emotional expression - it wasn't becoming of a disciple, supposed to be in the bliss of being SO privileged to the position of being a disciple and knowing god and his last messenger, nor of... you guessed it right 'a male'. This rule brought upon me a lot of havoc, as I was naturally inclined to emotions and wanted to express them. As a teen, I had outburst of rage when I was bullied, which caused negative effects on my schooling and education... and drove me to bully back my bullies, for a time. 

The long lasting effects, into my current middle-aged adulthood, include depression - I think that aside for my multiple traumas, the unnatural denial of my emotions drove me inwards and didn't help in avoiding developing chronic depression. On the other hand, I can't necessarily pinpoint what emotions I'm feeling anymore, confusing me and sometimes those around me, asking what it is that am going through, and I can't always reply. 

As a direct result of forbidden display and expression of emotions, I have difficulties in accepting that my feelings and emotions are valid, so I often struggle to stand up for myself in many interpersonal situations - in fact, my wife has to remind me that they're valid and to share them and to set my boundaries, another problem after my experiences in the cult, and the intricate association of gender to emotions.  Although I intellectually pushed these issues away, I still have to emotionally work in accepting my own needs and express them. I can, however, tell others who struggle with this same issue to stand up for themselves... easy advice to give, not to implement, it seems!

Another problem in gender stereotypes being enforced in childhood is that it took me decades (really, decades) to finally understand certain aspects of my personality and that I'm nonbinary. I feel that I lost all those years in finding true self-expression as gender-queer, nonbinary, and now that I do try to express these parts of myself , I find that am censoring the settings in which I do so. For example, I go out with either feminine or gender-neutral hairdos, but haven't dared to walk out of doors with my skirts, which I wear only at home, and only around friends who don't judge me for it. If strangers come, I still change to clothes which are either masculine or neutral (as seen in the cisworld, that is).

In this cult,  but also in other religions and cults, there was a clear separation between men and women, between boys and girls. Thus, each of us had no access to information about the other ; we seldom had any real interaction. My half-siblings and step-sibling and I were all sent to schools who also separated us - the school I was in the longest  had the biggest division : we were a whole street apart! Thus, with this additional Ultra Orthodox Jewish separated school system, we were estranged and relationships between pupils, and between siblings, were tainted by gender-biases and gender-separations, much like Victorian England, or any other purity culture, religiously driven society. 

As this cult merged abrahamic religions with hinduism and new-age, we were assigned different tasks and expected to fulfil specific roles in the collective formed by the disciples, headed by my father, the highest point in the hierarchy. My step mother had to deal with the 'mundanes' of book-keeping, food choosing, cooking, dishes and laundry, in short, being a slave. As a slave, though, she also had to micro-manage everyone else : she was, after all, the closest person to god/my father! with that came 'privileges' as well as 'duties' and prices to pay as a 'female' who can be dominated by evil (as seen above). 

She micro-managed the family unit as well as the disciples, who lodged elsewhere. 

The accounts were portioned for these two main units, and she could delegate the shopping duties to us all.  As the eldest 'son' I had been sent to do the groceries for the family unit, and when I grew older, to ALSO accompany the other 2 main disciples in their excursions, thus doubling my duties, and reducing theirs.. I also had cleaning duties (it's humble, I served each member in the collective), and given the role of 'protector', having to accompany my half-sisters to school, not only because they were younger, but specifically because I was 'male', a 'boy'. 

In composing this entry, I realized something else about the awful gender biases that my father indoctrinated me with: he made me hate my body, supposed to be a mere vessel to my soul and not to entertain any attachement to it - involving everything from sports to medication, to, in regards to very close subjects of gender : those of sexuality, self-image, and for a long time, my ideals of binary gender roles - which it took me years to change, partially on my own, partially with the help of people I exchanged with online.  Each of those side subjects could warrant separate blog entries, and another one the how I deconstructed my binary, cisgender norms, to become who I am and what I accept, but I'm not sure I remember enough details and cannot pinpoint each part of this journey... I'll try addressing parts of those another time. 

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