Since the Scripture stresses love, kindness, and forgiveness, it would follow that the period following the printing press should have been characterized by these three traits. Rather, the printing press spawned the Protestant Reformation, which stressed reforms that included reading Scriptures, destroying images, and jettisoning Mary.

The outbreak of fierce religious wars among kinsmen was unprecedented. Neighbors burned neighbors at the stake. This sadistic carnage occurred in the same period that historians call the Age of Reason. Perhaps the steep rise of literacy in European society reinforced its left hemisphere at the expense of its right.

While the literate countries were bestowing on posterity the works of Galileo, Shakespeare, Newton, and Bach, the men suffered a psychosis so extreme they believed their women were so dangerous they must be murdered. The witch-hunts were the most virulent in those countries experiencing the steepest rise in literacy rates. Russia remained largely illiterate throughout this period and also suffered no witch hunts.

A colossal shift I call the Iconic Revolution began in the 19th century. The invention of photography and the discovery of electromagnetism combined to bring us film, television, computers, graphic advertising and the Internet; all of which are based on images. The increasing reliance on right brain pattern recognition instead of left brain linear sequencing has moved culture toward equilibrium between the two hemispheres, between masculine and feminine, between word and image. Since
the advent of television, women are reclaiming rights that they formally exercised. Women are serving as priestesses once again and literate cultures saturated with image information are once again embracing feminine values. The medium is the message. Perhaps, the thug who mugged the goddess was the invention of literacy.

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55th Anniversary Alfred Korzybski lecture by Leonard Shlain, The Alphabet vs The Goddess (PDF, 4 pages)

Link to internet file: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1aae/99a9c9c09d0bc34e8cc25e25104857b945b8.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwjv9djfjbvfAhXJwVkKHXXgBj8QFjAMegQIBBAB&usg=AOvVaw3gQNBNMy92bUJuD9NlXJ_O