Friday Music Blogging: We'll Fall

This week, being female in the Blogosphere was hazardous to your sanity. That savage beating of dissenters at Pandagon over engagement rings spilled over the edge and dripped predictably onto I Blame the Patriarchy and - less predictably - Sadly, No! There were other residual brawls, all with the same problem: no one listened to anyone else. Nothing was learned. Not a single "Eureka!" in all that stinky mess.

Pity.



Just...listen, and let this settle in:

A thousand years ago, when I was a young woman getting engaged, I too had political problems with the engagement ring and "bride price" baggage. An older woman who came from an agricultural society told me in her culture, like it or not, the husband's ability to save up for an engagement ring was linked to the future security of the family. The ring was the family's emergency investment. A wife was the guardian of the family's security and kept it where she could see it at all times. When something catastrophic happened, off came the ring, and the family would survive.

So you can see the practical partnership, if you wish, or you can see the corrupting materialism the Furs reviled - until they adopted it themselves.