Witches

As far back as I can remember, the idea of "Witches" fascinated me, there was such an allure about them, dark powerful women, who could cast a spell on you, for love, death, good and bad. It was as if I  wanted to become one, subconsciously for the power I felt as if they held.
Witches, in my opinion have always been the female equals, if not almost the more powerful female to the male, so it was interesting to me to hear a class discussion about the "gender" struggle between witches and wizards, and the "inequality" factor there is.
Ironically enough I read "Equal Rites"for class,  Esk, a young girl, it thrown into the position of becoming the new "Wizard", because Drum Billet, is soon going to die and has waited to long to find his male replacement. Also because the new born child was actually supposed to be a boy, but was apparently a girl.
The story is the struggle and rise of Esk, becoming and accepting her new given powers, and title. Though I thought the book was well written and I did in-fact enjoy reading this story, the discussions had in class left me wondering, as if all these "Witches", I once thought was so powerful, was actually all women fighting to over come their male "successors", or am I just at a place within life, and within this class is it actually is more of just a personal type of opinion deal. Granted yes "Equal Rites" was actually written for that purpose, if possibly I may have had a better overall feeling and outcome, with this read if I had gotten through the entire book with out a more biased class opinion.
With that said, I still personally find "Witches" to be powerful women roles, created to show and empower females, with the sense of being equal. strong, independent humans that have the ability to control their lives.