do you believe in the patriarchy?

And I focus my efforts on fighting against oppression experienced by women - not oppression experienced by men.

Of course feminism is about focussing on the other forms of oppression women experience. You think feminists haven't been instrumental in fighting all kinds of oppression against women? What its not about is focussing on the oppression experienced by men. Thats the real difference.

Or do you only have an interest in the things women suffer when they are purely a result of them being female? Is that it? So you're fighting oppression based on sex when it's targeted towards women... But not when it's targeted towards men and not when women are oppressed for any reason other than their sex?

You're missing my point, by focusing on patriarchy, you are failing deal with the other sources of oppression on women.

In the fight against discrimination and prejudice, I put women's needs first. Why is that aiming for female supremacy?

I recognise for example that in the fight aginst racism many activists put the needs of black people first. This is fine.

Womens needs must not be put first... That would be female supremacy?

I'm saying women are oppressed by other influences too, so if we weren't oppressed because of our sex, we would still be open to oppression from other sources.

What do you think of internalized oppression?

Naming and fighting patriarchy puts the needs of wsomen first. That is what is important.

No one is saying that patriarchy doesn't exist. What I am saying is that even if men did not oppress women based purely on our sex, there would still be opression of women. Therefor patriarchy is too simplistic a concept and kyriarchy explains the intersectionality of opression much better.

Sorry bejeezus

Not all racism is derived from white males... Why do you think it is?

This article gives an interesting overview of the different ideologies with regards to patriarchy understanding patriarchy

"It helps to explain how women themselves can in some cases morph into the supremacist bully, when paranoid mothers pass on anxieties about food and bodies to their daughters, ground down themselves by years of trying to live up to constructed notions of beauty." WTAF!!!

I know - it's like "Pity the poor men as the kyriarchy has forced them to watch too much porn, and let's put that on the same level as women suffering rape and domestic violence"

So it comes back to - what about the men! Again. Jeezus

"Kyriarchy, by contrast, accounts for the increasing numbers of men who are suffering from sexual performance anxiety or emotional disconnection with women, which can be related to x-rated overconsumption, " And this is the fault of who, exactly?

Eclectic - I think other oppression happens, of course it does. But why does kyriarchy only ever get brought up when talking about female oppression??

I don't see when someone is talking about racism, ageism, etc someone posting about kyriarchy. It doesn't happen. So I think it is a way of silencing women talking about female oppression.

Himalaya, with due respect, I'm another one who cannot really understand what your fundamental argument is, or what your posts are really driving at. I see a lot of talk about nature and evolution and a lot of straw man arguments about what you think feminists believe, but it's not clear to me what your overall point is.

Like swallowed I don't like to drag my degree into this, but I'm about to get a phd in the social sciences so I am quite comfortable with theory and exploration and admitting what I don't know, multivariate drivers, etc and so on. FWIW I think a lot of behavioural economics is really interesting, especially in a development context.

There is overwhelming evidence that women are systematically and globally oppressed within our current social order. Thus, I personally think it makes sense to refer to that order as patriarchal. This is not a comment on its causes, merely an observation of its condition. I'm happy to consider a whole host of possible causes.

To say that multiple causes means that you cannot attach a label or description to the condition of something is profoundly anti-theoretical, not to mention unhelpful.

For those of you who think kyriarchy is a distraction... So do you believe that the oppression of women is fundamental to all other types of oppression?

Economies are made up of people making choices. You can study the psychology of choices as part of biology.

Economies can also be thought of as evolving through the transmission and spread of technologies and ways of organising (customs, business models, ideas) through the population.