Oh and here again, is a cut and paste of Onebatmother's post, because there are so many threads which are so determined to ignore all the arguments:
"For anyone interested in how cultures work when one group has historically had power over another, there is a mechanism in which one subgroup of the powerless takes responsibility for preventing the group as a whole from empowering themselves.
The powerless are thus in effect self-repressing, and the dominant group need do very little in order to maintain the status quo.
In caste cultures, there is often an undercaste which is responsible for ensuring that the dominant caste is not disturbed or threatened by subordinate castes.
In slavery cultures, likewise.
In cultures which are extremely patriarchal, it is often the older women who are responsible for policing the rest of their sex, and enforcing the rules of patriarchy. It is their reward for having submitted to the rules themselves, and they have a vested interest in ensuring that repression continues, because they might otherwise be forced to acknowledge their own repeated humiliation.
In developed cultures the differentiation between older women and younger is not so marked, and the responsibility for enforcing the cultural norms which keep women disempowered is shared amongst all women.
D'ya see where I'm going with this?"
I've seen a lot of enforcer behaviour on this thread as on all the others.
Is someone going to start yet another thread about this subject now? I'll chase you around if you do...