do you believe in the patriarchy?

[bejeezusWC]

A poster on another thread said she views feminism as the struggle against patriarchy. That is how I view it too. I believe that is considered the rad fem stance?

Another poster said she didn't believe in patriarchy

I don't geddit

Why/how are women so unequal if not for patriarchal societies? WHO has been oppressing us?

Please tell me what you think, if you don't believe in patriarchy

kyriarchy I think is just used as another way imo of saying stop talking about female oppression and start talking about other kinds of oppression instead. Of course other types of opression exist, but this is literally the only context I have ever seen thsi word being used in

Would somebody care to tell me who holds the power and controls power structures in this so called Kyriarchy?

(Hint it isn't women.)

It is just another distraction.

I have got all confused. Are we now arguing:

Patriarchy is all down to evolution - it is the "natural order" - men are stronger than women so....blah blah blah

vs

Patriarchy is a social construct made up of lots of different influence, cultural and historical and, yes there might be a bit of evolution in there...

vs

It doesn't matter how it came about, it is shit and needs to stop.?

Thanks!

SAF -

"you are applying a biological term and process to non biological 'things'." - we are biological things. At what point do we stop being biological?

"yes they'll win nobel prizes for theories that support the idea of the status quo being natural and good and some evolved state ffs"

Have you read any of Daniel Kahneman? How do you come to the conclusion that his work exploring the irrational ways humans make decisions about risk is about 'supporting the idea of the status quo being natural and good'?

Of course the status quo is 'some evolved state'. Dying of cancer is an evolved state. Extinction is an evolved state. Everything is an evolved state. It isn't another word for good, it is a way to understand the dynamics behind biology.

"i don't believe in pinnacles." I don't believe in pinnacles either. modern biology doesn't believe in pinnacles. Victorian social darwinists believed in pinnacles. You brought up the word pinnacle presumably because you think that something in modern biology or in what I am saying is based on the idea that there are pinnacles in evolution. Otherwise why bring it up?

This article explains a line of thought which I identify with. kyriarchy and patriarchy

I think that's about it Porto.

You just missed out 'patriarchy only exists in feminists' heads' and 'patriarchy doesn't advantage all men all the time and is a complex set of interlinking hierarchies - can we call that something else in order to take the focus off the fact that it is men running the show'.

porto it does seem like an enormous waste of energy doesnt it
all this arguing over terms......it amounts to the same, whatever you call it

Kyriarchy = Female porn stars are oppressing men.

What a vacuous argument.

Porto, I'd happily go with the second position. I haven't seen anybody arguing the first. Some seem to be arguing that the patriarchy is entirely cultural and has nothing to do with the way we have evolved (I think - I'm pretty confused too).

I think the third position doesn't really get us very far. Male violence won't stop just because we want it to. I think there is nothing wrong with looking to see if biology can give us some clues as to the root causes of male violence - not to excuse the status quo but in the hope that greater understanding will enable us to eradicate it quicker. I completely understand why feminists are very wary of biological explanations though because they have been so dreadfully misused over the years.

I agree kyriarchy is a distraction.

yes WE are biological things, animals and evolution applies to us as such. economies are not. how is this fucking unclear unless you're deliberately obfuscating.

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.

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?

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.

I think they go hand in hand, and overlap

Racism for example...the origin is the same

White male supremacy

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.

"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?

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

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"

please dont take my name in vain EBL

"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!!!

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

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

Sorry bejeezus

no it isnt....I am thinking about slavery on which Britain was built...and how that shaped the world and our country....and the attitudes in society today

So...I agree...but I am talking from a UK perspective

Although...colonalism, which is a mostly a result of white male supremacy...has also hugely shaped alot of the world and societies