The Good Mother By Ellen Cronan Rose - 1115 Words

The idea of Mother Earth is extremely empowering for women; most women believe that, right? Ellen Cronan Rose finds the idea of mother earth tremendously unempowering. Rose writes in her article â€Å"The Good Mother: from Gaia to Gilead†, that the imagery of mother earth is deeply problematic and is harmful to the feminist cause. This is a shocking view considering that most women don’t seem to have a problem with that idea. Ellen Cronan Rose states that the â€Å"mother earth† metaphor is harmful to the way women are viewed in society because it perpetuates negative stereotypes against women, it views the earth and women primarily as producers, and it overlooks the fact that both men and women are connected to nature. She goes in-depth into how mother earth imagery can impact women. The first issue that Rose has with the mother earth image is that it appears to feed into male stereotypes for women. She quotes a New Age article that states: â€Å"The Earth is currently terrified. Now, that’s a shocker, isn’t it? Great big Earth Goddess†¦The Big Lady quaking in her well worn earth boots†¦She scared. She needs some powerful comforting.† (Bagley and McIntosh 221). Language like this shows that some people connect women with weakness, and that the earth and women need a strong man to save them. This goes to show that while some women may be empowered by the idea of a mother earth, others can abuse that idea and twist it into something that is oppressive. There are still sexist people out