Thanks you for addressing these prevalent attitudes. I have someting to add. I will never accept the crazy dogma of the kind of mentally deranged (branch of, cuz a few of y'all got some sense) patriarchy which constantly suggests to woman that no matter what they do they are to be beneath men, they are deficient, or that they did something wrong my being born female. I follow what is evident that the woman's monthly cycle is a fact of life that isn't going anywhere. I guess I have been involved in and around the Rasta/Afro-centric community for most of my life, but I grow weary of the contradictions of these conversations. I thought this was a movement in tune with life's natural cycles. Perhaps my militant Detroit ghetto upbringing is fully cemented, because I DARE any man to suggest that the vessel that brought him (and every woman, dog, cat, rat and mouse) into existence is somehow now unclean, when going there is a primary the goal of the male gender.
This is a part of patriarchal dogma used to wipe out the religions of the pasts and the practice of using menstrual blood for spiritual/magical purposes. So rather than saying the woman is unclean during this period, let's be honest and say she is more spiritually potent and powerful during this period. This, and the accompanying physical pain, is reflected in her personality and moods making her more foreboding, perhaps, but unclean? Never. Men fear the true source of their existence, the matter of fact of the Divne Mother and the Divine Father, so they denigrate her and call her unclean when they are reminded of where they come from. It's all psychological, right over there with the veil and genital mutilation. The suggestion that women are unclean at any point in the month is nothing but a slam against her feminity, on par with a slam for being black for having Godgiven naturally dark skin. The obvious divinity of the woman's sexual organs continues to evoke these crazy responses right down to the continued and practice of genital mutilation.

Also, while we are on the topic, what standards do we have as a community of African males and females towards one another? Where are we really going with the rates of AIDS infections and baby's momma's and daddy's and a Pan African community constantly in grief and despair? The news about the sugar daddies spreading AIDS makes me ask, who really is paying all that much attention to whether an African woman or man is clean or not when you look at the big picture? Where are our standards? What are are our standards if we have any as black people? I mean when it comes to how we treat one another on a regular basis starting with in our home family interactions and relationships.