>Women are equal with men - unless they decide to stay at home and be a Mom to their kids - at least that's what I'm hearing from several here...
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>>2) The fact that it works in your family doesn't mean it will work everywhere.
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>I've never said that it would.

I thought you were saying that the Bible states, that women should be subservient to men.

>>The Bible quotation(s), that women should be subservient to men, may very well be used elsewhere as an excuse for opression.
>>
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>That's not me - that's not what I believe - so why be offended at me?

Even if you don't believe this, it is an inconvenient starting-point. People have been known to use every excuse to opress other people. This may be one reason that there is a growing tendency nowadays of rejecting anything that even remotely resembles prejudice in any form.

>>3) For many people, what the Bible says or doesn't say is quite secondary, especially if it opposes a generally-held belief. (My own point of view is that mankind needs new Holy Scriptures.)
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>That's your view - mine is different.

Sure.

> I would never make fun of you for your beliefs - but - it seems quite fine for others to make fun of mine.

Well, I think many feel offended at what does indeed look like discrimination against women. Frankly, I can't blame them, although some have overstepped the boundaries of courtesy.

I had indeed read the particular Bible passage quoted when I was a child, and found it quite disturbing. I would now phrase the reason for this more or less like this: How can this discriminatory Bible verse (as it seemed to me at that time) be reconciled with the idea that the Bible is a Holy Book (as we Bahá'ís are taught).

I now think there may have been a reason for this, which was not related to discrimination. For example (and there may be other explanations): that it was deemed convenient at that time - 2000 years ago - to adapt to a certain social structure; this was not because God wanted things to stay like this in the long run, but because the inferiority of women (as considered by society) was well-established, and it was not deemed convenient to change things suddenly. Sometimes progress does take a while. So this particular change in society was postponed for a later time; Jesus Christ wanted to concentrate on other things.