Suffer Not a Woman to Speak. R

The article “Suffer Not a Woman to Speak” talks about the struggles women went through in colonial times. Part of the article explains how religion helped shape the idea that Women aren’t equal, or as important as men. While the article focuses on how religion influenced the way people view women, I feel that we should keep in mind that this was the way of life in colonial America. A lot of the things that happened back then wouldn’t fit into our culture and society today. I’m not trying to make an excuse the cruel injustices and stereotypes that women have had to fight over the years, but the ideals we are used to and the ideals the women of colonial times were used to are very different.

Religion was an extremely important part of colonial America. It influenced everything, including how men and women perceived each other. In the story of Adam and Eve, Eve was made out of Adams rib to show equality between the two sexes. Although they were supposed to be seen as equal, Eve ate the forbidden fruit before Adam and to certain people (especially Calvinists) this proved that women are more susceptible to sin. God spoke to Eve and revealed to her that she will now be ruled by her husband.

In a world and a time where the bible and religion influenced everything, women were automatically forced into the role of “servant” to their husbands. With the women forced to serve the men, there is an instant inequality between the two sexes. Although this is bad for women, that was the way of life back in colonial America. It sounds horrible that a woman should be a “servant” to her husband; it may not have sounded as bad back then. Ideas like that seemed normal in colonial society. After all, women were only taught what was important at the time, and that was how to be a good wife, and a caring mother.

Even though women were accustomed to these stereotypes, some of them did try to break free. Anne Hutchinson was a Puritan from the Massachusetts Bay Colony who held meetings at her home. She showed women that they could be more than just a servant, and that the women could speak and have intellectual conversations without men. The men who ran the community tolerated these meetings, but when she started straying away from Puritan views she was quickly exiled. This punishment may sound harsh, but Hutchinson and her family could’ve been considered lucky that they weren’t executed. Punishments like being exiled or executed definitely were not rare in colonial America.

Women have come a long way since then, which is why it’s so hard to accept what happened. It seems like sometimes we let our modern way of thinking get in the way of realizing that, while a lot of the actions against women were horrible, the women didn’t really know any other lifestyle, and were used to these stereotypes.