Kyriarchy?

[ChristinedePizan]

I saw this term on a website:http://fuckyeahfeminists.com/ and it's not something I've come across before. I googled it and didn't feel much the wiser when I got the wiki definition

Anyone feel able to elaborate?

Sorry, hope that didn't sound arsey! I really didn't mean it to and I totally agree that;

"if mainstream feminists refuse to recognise the impact of other forms of oppression, then THAT is genuinely divisive."

Beachcomber - I think we're going to have to agree to disagree on the women and institutional power thing. I hope that doesn't come across as snotty, because I've really enjoyed your comments.

CRIKRI - I think your third paragraph is absolutely key. I think words can often have a lot of baggage and to some feminists, the term patriarchy is too loaded with being told sexism is more important then racism, etc and so they prefer the term Kyriarchy. For others, patriarchy is what it's all about and the link to Twisty's blog posted above describes that really well. I think it's ok to differ on these terms, because the goal remains the same.

Here is a very good post on intersectionality, not so much for the post itself, but the comments, which show where it comes from and how easy it is for those origins to be ignored. www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2011/09/04/the-meaning-of-intersectionality/

Not snotty at all GothAnneGeddes.

I just want to blame the patriarchy for everything

Okay, this is a bit simplistic I expect but it's how my mind works.

We live in a patriarchal society. Whether you live in Niger, England, Somalia, Indonesia, Colombia, men are in charge. In a society where nearly everyone has a similar skin colour, (like in Somalia), there is a patriarchal system. If you live in a society where most people have a similar skin colour but some don't (like in the UK), there is still a patriarchal system. Even if you live in a society where skin colour is pretty evenly balanced (like in some parts of London), the people still live in a patriarchal system.

I don't understand why there is a need to replace the word patriarchy with kyriarchy.

There were some interesting comments on that page, GAD, that reflected my concerns about narrowness and about hierarchy.

As a feminist woman, I should never fail to observe where sexism is in play (though I do, being an imperfect feminist) or stop working to mitigate and/or remove sexism. The fact that I'm a feminist woman doesn't, however, give me authority to know what ails every woman. I am sure that sexism ails every woman to an extent, because of the patriarchy. But, if my Brixton neighbours say racism is an even bigger problem for them than sexism, then I must respect their more informed judgement.

It's impossible, therefore, to look at feminist issues without also taking other -isms into account. The only exception to this is when I'm looking at feminist issues relating to white, able-bodied, straight, educated women in Britain - I'm competent to identify how much of the problem is down to sexism here, because no other -isms are at work. This came home to me on a personal level when I started to experience ageism.

Feminism, imo, should recognise the importance of intersectionality without either diluting its own message or downplaying other factors.

The essay on kyriarchy that I read appealed to me because of the honeycomb idea. Real life doesn't suggest rigid, layer-cake power structures to me; more a system of privileges balanced precariously upon one another. If hierarchies were neatly defined, you'd be able to declare that one disadvantage was worse than the other - but you can't. Does an educated, straight woman have more or fewer privileges than an illiterate, gay man? How the hell do you measure that?

I believe it's natural for humans to seek hierarchical structures - plural - because we're hard-wired to look for patterns. They help us predict what will happen in a given situation. But I think it's a mistake to say there's a hierarchy, or a hierarchy of hierarchies: it's an oversimplification.

I'm rambling far too much here, mainly beacuse I keep being scared of saying feminism should be taking care of other human problems besides sexism! That's not what I think, of course; feminism exists specifically to address sexism against women. But I do think it can be too narrow, too rigid and too hierarchical in its theories. Eradication of the patriarchy would not cure all human ills. Feminism should recognise that it's part of a complex, in which each part's relative importance must shift according to circumstances.

... even that's a bit waffly, but at least it's only one paragraph

Dittany, have just seen your post above mine and recognise your points. My brain needs a rest to absorb.

I feel like I need a three dimensional model to keep hold of the complexity here :)

Christine - what you say is true about all of the nations/societies you cite being patriarchal. But, there are other divisions within society which mean some groups have greater privileges than others. That might be about the relative darkness/lightness of skin tone, or cultural/clan/tribal background, your faith, political allegiance as well as other "indicators" of social, political and economic value and status you get in the UK - like sexual orientation, class, disability, etc.) So, patriarchy isn't the only oppression game in town.

And, that is what GAD was saying can be a problem with "mainstream feminists," who seem unable to recognise that women (and men) can experience multiple, overlaid and interlaid forms of oppression when they are identified with more than one group seen as "inferior" by society.

The intersectionality bit is where it starts to get complex. If you are a white woman, you are disadvantaged due to sexism, but you have other advantages due to your ethnicity, perhaps compounded by your potential to "influence" privileged white males through your relationship with them (stuff Catherine Hakim would probably class as "using erotic capital" vomit.) But what if you are or a trans woman? That drops you down a few notches on the status bar but if you're from a middle class background, that can bump you back up.

The same could be said for a Black man - male privilege = (hand up from men in general), racism = (slap down from society), education = (hand up to more economic opportunities), disability = (slap down due to able-bodied chauvinism.)

I realise that's a very, very simplistic explanation of it so apologies if it doesn't hit the right note. One of my lightbulb moments on this issue happened about 15 or 16 years ago in a training course led by Ellen Pence of the Domestic Abuse Intervention Project of Duluth. It was through using the Power & Control Wheel that I realised just how similar the mechanisms and methods of oppression in society are, regardless of the group they are used against.

(dang, shouldn't have gone off to have cake and coffee in the middle of a post!)

Dittany - I am by no means pro sex industry, but I still feel Kyriarchy is a valuable concept. Talking about the violence underpinning the patriarchy is absolutely true, but then so is the violence holding racism and white supremacy.

Again, if Kyriarchy doesn't cut it as a concept for you, if it doesn't describe what you are fighting against, don't use it; but I think we should accept why others do want to use it and we definitely shouldn't be looking askance at them for doing so.

Could you possibly be a bit less patronizing Dittany, there's really no need for it. I really disagree with your framing here, it's clear where the concepts of kyriarchy and intersectionality come from and it's not as a long winded way of promoting the sex industry.

Again: don't like it, don't use it, but don't deny women of colour, women with disabilities etc, the right to define oppression as they see it on their own terms.

Beachcomber, I nodded along to your post this morning, which said: "each and every human interaction is 'polluted' if you like, by the twin concepts of domination and submission.

"These concepts at group or societal level become supremacy and oppression.

"I think this is what the word kyriarchy is trying to represent, except that we already have a word for it already - patriarchy."

That heads back into the question of what patriarchy means, exactly, and the fact that it's a gendered word. Of course you're right, Dittany, that the violence and oppression which bring about stark inequalities are predominantly exercised by men. I think 'predominantly' is a big issue here. I'd argue that women can perpetrate violent subordination of others. I'd also point out that human rights only exist reliably where they are enforced by law, which is done predominantly by men (seeing as they're the ones in charge.)

It's largely an argument about words, isn't it - or about the relative blame for societal ills, which may be laid at the feet of men. If it's just about words (as I hope,) there ought not to be too much of a conflict because kyriarchy encompasses the concept and the fact of patriarchy. It shouldn't affect feminist principles because feminism is about liberating women from gendered oppression. It's not feminism's job to liberate black women from racial oppression as well ... or is it?

Am willing to be told where I'm wrong here!

Lenin, the matriarchy thread's really interesting, but hasn't answered my opinion about how much oppression is male in origin - OK, 99.999% but I would expect that to change as women succeed in wresting more power from those damn patriarchs, iyswim.

I'm just popping back in to link to Twisty's last post because I luff her very much and this way I can just say "what she said".

Oh yes, CRIKRI, yes there are hierarchies in every society, sorry if I didn't make it clear that I appreciate that. But what I was trying (and failing to say) is that patriarchy is the base, the other layers of oppression are heaped on top of it. Patriarchy supports the whole.

And yes, what Twisty said :o

I don't see what kyriarchy is adding to the mix - we already have patriarchy and intersectionality as analytic tools plus all the 'isms'.

I'm another one who is wary of the how and why this term was coined.

Also what dittany said about male violence is pretty well what I meant with my use of 'domination'. I cannot think of a single oppressive system which is founded on female violence. That is what I meant when I said that women do not have institutionalised power. We may at times benefit from it (white privilege for example) but we don't have any ownership of it (not that I think that is a bad thing - what woman wants to own something founded on male violence?).

I guess it would be simpler if I just said;

white supremacy is patriarchal
classism is patriarchail
abelism is patriarchial
homophobia is patriarchal

and so on.

Intersectionality is the word used to describe the resulting 'melting pot' of the different social hierarchies which underpin a patriarchy.

Hi,

I don't think this has been linked to before, but it made me think about the problems, in terms of the ways the term could very easily be misused:

www.myecdysis.com/2010/11/truthout-about-kyriarchy-an-open-letter-to-feminist-writers-bloggers-and-journalists/

For me - sorry, I know this sounds very basic - the problem is, with a term like patriarchy, we all know what the actual meaning is. And if you look it up in a dictionary, it is self-explanatory: the rule of the fathers. Gotcha. And if you wanted to delve a bit, you'd probably get that the term 'patriarch' can specifically mean the male founders and leaders of the Judeo-Christian religion, that it is a Greek term with an academic sound to it. And you could bring those things to inform your view if you so chose.

With this term kyriarchy, I'm sorry, I still do not understand what its root meaning is. I've googled and read a lot, and all I come up with is the root meaning of the Greek words (which leaves me no wiser, as I am not sure which meaning of kyrios is intended or how - the different connotations don't seem to me to add to the term as they do with patriarchy), and the explanation that it was a coinage to describe intersecting structures of oppression. I assume Fiorenza called it 'kyriarchy' and not 'bob' for a reason, but can anyone let me in on her thinking?

Sorry if that sounds a bit wishy-washy. But personally, I am really uneasy about signing up to a word when I don't fully understand what the thinking behind it was.