MEMBERS of Jamaica’s gender movement have lashed out against the Jamaica Labour Party’s (JLP’s) Joan Gordon-Webley’s reported likening of Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller to the infamous biblical character, Jezebel.

Gender consultant Dr Glenda Simms said the incident, if nothing else, had presented yet another opportunity for men to belittle women, while allowing for the maintenance of patriarchy.

“We are very negative about women. We like to put women down. So this is just an extension of this psyche. I am just so disappointed when we, given leadership, continue to do the things we do to keep women in the place that was designed for them in the patriarchal system,” she told the Sunday Observer yesterday.

“And when women slur other women, the patriarch smiles because everybody can say ‘we tell you that women not good and women are always pulling each other down’. The more women put other women down, it boosts what the patriarch defends (and) the more the patriarch will smile. That helps the patriarch to retain his position as the king or as the ruler,” she added.

President of Woman Inc, Joyce Hewett agreed.

They say sometimes among women that we are our own worse enemy. And it is just unfortunate that in this day and age that one has to resort or feels the need to resort – even if it is in the heat of emotion – to what is really degrading and certainly unfavourable-type comment,” Hewett said.

“To bring it out of a political arena makes it even more troubling because we certainly are to be moving towards a more peaceful and collaborative (time). We don’t expect it of men so why do we want to set the example from the female perspective that this is the manner in which we chose to challenge one another,” she added.

Simms noted that there was no justifying the use of a reference such as that and that she would be equally unaccepting had a man used it.

“I wouldn’t accept it if a man had said it either. It would be the same issue. The Jezebel character in the Bible is an archetype of how women are devalued – whether in Biblical literature or so on,” she said.

But more than that, the gender consultant said there was no disputing the deliberate nature of the reference.

“Anyone who used that, I see it as a major slur. It is not just any Biblical figure. You go to the Bible and pull out the figure who is most vilified. So it is not something that just rolled off your tongue. It is a deliberate choice of a character that vilifies women,” said Simms, who is also the prime minister’s senior advisor on gender and development.

“There are others, but I think the Jezebel character is seen as the worse. She exemplifies all the negative things we feel about women in a patriarchal society. So who would want to be likened to this Biblical character? The Bible didn’t give her any redeeming features so I don’t see why we would be using her to describe any women among us in any part of the world. It is very negative,” she added.

Gordon-Webley has, however, scoffed at the criticisms from her critics, insisting she was only reading from the Bible, during her address at the JLP divisional meeting in Albert Town Trelawny last Sunday night.

“I am merely reading the Bible, quoting from the Bible,” said the JLP candidate for South-East St Andrew.

But Hewett said she “cringed” on hearing a clip of the remarks last Thursday morning, while at a local radio station for an interview.

“When I heard the clip, I cringed because I said how are we, even as a nation, going to move forward when we resort to that level. We need to bring it up a notch or two without a doubt. We need to set examples and be role models,” she said.

Hewett added that it was time that people, despite contending points of view, begin to respect each other.

“We need to demonstrate a level of respect for one another, even though we are at totally opposite ends of opinion. You can be in the furthermost corner of an opinion and I in another, but let me respect you for your opinion. That is what we need to strive for,” she said.

Anything else, she noted, is unacceptable – especially if women intend to be taken seriously and with respect by members of the opposite sex.