TOD 10.12.07

I love bumper stickers because they are so much fun to unpack and think about. For example, I recently saw one I’ve seen many times before. It said, “Well-behaved women rarely make history.” But why is it so important to “make history?” If she means being known by historians, well, I prefer to trust God with the judgment of my importance rather than history professors. Furthermore, why would a woman care so much about getting the approval of mostly male historians?

But perhaps she means making history in the sense of shaping it, even anonymously. Yet, don’t all history-makers have mothers? That’s “making history,” even if she doesn’t make it into the history books. I think the real message here is to be rebellious. “Whatever you do, ladies, be disruptive. That’s the only way to matter in this world.” It’s not a favorable rephrase, but it’s surely accurate. The problem is that the it runs precisely counter to the Biblical model of femininity.

So in the end the driver of the car might just as well say to women, “The only way you can matter is by being men,” though I somehow doubt that’s what she intended her bumper to proclaim.