WHY MOROCCO CONTINUED

Womanhood, Manhood & Rites of Passage
I finally accepted one date the day before I was to leave Marrakech.  The cool thing is that people here don't really date in the traditional sense, they hang out in groups, cook, go see music and just talk for hours.  So dating ain't about how fast can I get you in bed and then ghost, but rather how can I get to really know you.  So I found myself at a dinner party the night before I was to fly out in a room full of people speaking French, Spanish, Arabic, English & Amazigh who kept feeding me cured lemon chicken tagine and figs...so I was hardly saying no. 

And in this room,  I got to just sit back and be.   And the more I did that, the more room I gave people to approach, in this country, they fearlessly asked questions, prodded me to state my heart's desire, what I love.  None of the usual bullshit: 

• being so impressed with how smart I was
• fear because I'm so "intimidating" (is that me or just your lack of self-worth?)
• passive aggressive diminishing me to make themselves feel better

You know all the shit we do in America at parties.  Because being a fabulous woman  is what the fuck every woman is supposed to be, at least in Morocco.  Being a diva is part of the meaning of womanhood here...it's not the exception to the rule like it is in America and that's the kind of family I grew up in where womanhood is synonomous with divahood (brillant, fabulous, self-sufficient, expecting to be cared for, valued, etc)...the two are inseparable. 

​White women wouldn't need to be feminists if they knew how to be women and hold these toxic, racists white men accountable.    Feminism actually holds no one accountable which is one of my major problems with it aside from the historical racism/classicism inherent in feminism.  Any movement that doesn't have getting food, water, healthcare and education for poor brown and black women and children as it's prime objective is some bullshit I have zero interest in.   Because that shit is the definition and major concern of black womanhood.  In the absence of this prime objective, it's basically just some folks trying to be like white men and get what they have and fuck everybody else......but I digress.

Where was I?  Ah , yes, feminism.  It's not a proper right of passage.  Rites of passage teach you your responsibility to other human beings in the family unit, the societal unit.  Rites of passage ensure you develop and grow into a productive, non-toxic member of society with a purpose, a dharma, a role to play.  Rites of passage help you mature through each new stage in your life so that you don't stay stuck in old patterns, but grow from the mistakes of the past and evolve.

We don't have that in the US and that's the problem...rites of passage come from culture and if your only culture is becoming homogenous so we can sell more things to more people and get rich, then rites of passage are non existent.  There's no place for them in a cultureless society with shallow values.

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