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

"Bonobos are sometimes called pygmy chimpanzees even though they are about the same size as chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes). Overall, they have a more gracile, or slender, build than chimpanzees. They exhibit moderate sexual dimorphism with adult males weighing about 39 kg (86.0 lb) and, on average, measuring 730 to 830 mm (2.40 to 2.72 ft) tall while adult females weigh about 31 kg (68.3 lb) and are about 700 to 760 mm (2.3 to 2.49 ft) tall (Rowe 1996)."
pin.primate.wisc.edu/factsheets/entry/bonobo

As Plenty says, sexual display is no indicator of anything except strange preferences by species! The female bonobo's bottom swells during ovulation. So what

You're really not going to win the old "men are big & strong to protect poor ickle women" argument, chaps. Really! We are not a height-dimorphic species. The fat/muscle difference is explained entirely by childbearing. Men don't protect women anyhow, and never have.

Patriarchy exists, all right, but it's not a natural necessity. Can we get on with discussing what it is, after all?

garlicbum

The gender dimorphism is only 6%. That is not a big enough difference to be explained by evolutionary selection.

...how do you know? Evolution of everything happens by tiny, tiny steps - a cluster of cells that can distinguish light and dark develops into an eye etc...

To fetch water, build houses, hunt and farm etc... you don't have to have the pecs and arms of a man. Women are perfectly capable of doing these things, and are strong but don't have the explosive strength and upper body muscles of men (even when they have the same calories and do the same work).

The question is what explains why men get muscley at puberty. It isn't because they don' have babies. Otherwise children with excess calories would put on muscle. They don't.

Peacocks tails and stag's antlers as PlentyofPubes says both evolved from sexual selection - but in different ways. Men's muscles evolved more like stags antlers than peacock's tails I would say.

garlicbum "You're really not going to win the old "men are big & strong to protect poor ickle women" argument, chaps. "

That is not what i am saying at all.

Men evolved big and strong to fight each other over women. Quite a different thing!

Oh, Himalaya, you're so wedded to your big & strong masculinity! Bless

YY, evolution happens by tiny steps but other mammals, which have been evolving for about as long as we have or for less time, have 50% dimorphism. Surely we'd have managed more than 6% if it actually mattered.

You're not all that more muscular, I'm sorry to say. A fit woman and an inactive man have about the same fat-muscle ratio.

It's just more logical to put the difference down to childbearing. What you say about children gaining fat is irrelevant - both sexes change a lot, hormonally, during puberty and growth is regulated by hormones. Both genders of children put on fat in preparation for growth.

Garlicbum-

You have a strange idea of how evolution works. It's like saying we've been evolving for the same amount of time as birds, you'd think we would have wings by now. (by the way we've all been evolving for the same amount of time - humans, millepedes, bacteria)

Every organisms evolution has been shaped by it's environment (including it's social environment) there is no particular target for sexual diamorphism or number of legs or whatever.

There are differences between men and women that are not due to the physiology of having babies or not. Male bodies are not just like female bodies but with different reproductive bits. The differences have an evolutionary basis. That is really uncontroversial.

Yes, I get your point

You also seem to be agreeing that there's no evidence of an evolutionary advantage to male humans being much bigger than females!

I don't think you can discount the importance of birthing to evolution - there wouldn't be any evolution without effective birthing!

Also: I believe the development of the bigger human brain is due to the split fontanelle, which allows for brain expansion post-birth, and which occurred in response to the elongation & narrowing of the birth canal due to walking upright all the time. You couldn't get a human head out of a 'sapiens' birth canal without the split, which allows the two halves of the brain to slide past one another on descent.

If your peculiar statement that "Male bodies are not just like female bodies but with different reproductive bits" is supposed to mean "Men are bigger and stronger, shut up", then I do dispute that and suggest it's an unfounded patriarchal view of human evolutionary development. When I look at the actual evidence, instead of blindly accepting Victorian interpretations of limited data, then I don't find any material differences that cannot be more logically explained by improved birthing efficiency.

garlicbum

No I don't mean shut up at all.

I do think you've got the wrong end of the stick though. Its not Victorian or patriarchal to notice that there are differences between male and female bodies that have nothing to do with having babies or not - hairiness, facial differences, voice, fat:muscle, foot size, height etc...

Male bodies are bigger and stronger (not better or more entitled or closer to god or whatever...) just bigger and stronger - better able to do push ups, pull ups what have you.

"A fit woman and an inactive man have about the same fat-muscle ratio." - but why would you compare a fit woman and an inactive man? If you want to look at whether there is a difference between male and female fat-muscle you would have to look at a fit man vs a fit woman or an inactive man vs inactive woman.

(I don't know if you meant to say you're meaning me by the way?)

Given that this muscle is expensive for bodies to grow there has to be some reason for it.

(have we had this discussion before?)

Eh? No, I don't know anything about your body Himalaya!

Yeah, some circles are becoming obvious in our discussion. I need to take a break, anyway, so shall bid you a tall but lardy (me) goodnight :)

Goodnight