What social/economic conditions support the existence of a patriarchy and what changes would signal its end?

[deleted] · 2017-07-12T22:16:22+00:00

What social/economic conditions support the existence of a patriarchy

War, calamity, scarcity, expansion, hard times. Anytime when the social structure needs to function as effectively as possible a patriarchy will inevitably result

what changes would signal its end?

Long lasting kumbaya utopia where nobody is allowed to kill or conquer anyone and post scarcity has been achieved

Littleknownfacts · 2017-07-12T22:11:32+00:00

I'm no feminist, and I don't even really believe in a "patriarchy", but Caitlyn Jenner winning woman of the year nearly made me change my mind. I've got no problem with trans people, but if the only thing she did to earn the title was become a woman... Well damn why wasn't my picture on any magazine covers when I got my first moon's blood?

Princeso_Bubblegum · 2017-07-12T22:16:49+00:00

Patriarchy in the modern world has it roots in capitalism. You seen, as many manosphere people will point out, on average, women have children and have to deal with pregnancy and child rearing, this of course leads to women being able to work less and being less competitive, and this is the cause of the talked about earnings gap.

However, unlike manosphere people, I don't let sleeping dogs lye here, I think this is something that needs to be dismantled and that the work that women do needs to be valued, however, I am not under any delusion, unlike liberal feminists, that this can be done by consciousness uprising and treating women nicer, it is an inevitable result of capitalism. So to abolish the Patriarchy, we first must seize the means of production.

SpaceWhiskey · 2017-07-12T22:22:19+00:00

A recent example that comes to mind is Vice President Mike Pence making the offhand comment that he never has dinner with a woman without his wife present.

At face value, this could be interpreted as saying "...because I respect my marriage and don't date other women, duh." but having dinner is not necessarily a romantic date. It can often be a matter of business. What this tells me is that throughout his entire adult married life, he has never had a business dinner with a female peer or potential employee or boss. It tells me that he only associates with men in the business world, only gives the opportunity for such a networking opportunity or an after hours (but still expected) work gathering to men. And he's far from alone. Women are still excluded in many aspects of the business world by this old school boys club mentality.

Or hey, what about when Donald Jr said if a woman is being sexually harassed at work, she should get another job?

[deleted] · 2017-07-12T22:56:01+00:00

It can never end. There are enough interest groups out there who need an enemy to keep themselves going so they'll keep redefining it

Cunari · 2017-07-13T04:24:21+00:00

The patriarchy only favors top men. Feminists don't even want to demish the patriarchy. They want to take the patriarchy to give them power over lower status men.

firstpitchthrow · 2017-07-13T05:33:26+00:00

Here's my theory:

Patriarchy, as I think of it (the social domination of the interests of men over the interests of women) is only something that can come about during times of resource scarcity. A society where the interests of men dominate is one in which the natural way men allocate resources (competition) is dominant, and that aligns well with resource scarcity. There isn't enough food, or water, or shelter, or something, for everyone, so human beings compete with each other to claim what scarce resources there are. Those who do not get enough resources do not reproduce and die. Women, being biologically unable to compete for resources in times of scarcity on their own (particularly against men) had little choice but to depend on men for their resource allocation and continued survival.

I was once on the waiting list for an organ transplant (kidney) and I eventually got the transplant and my life is strong and healthy now. Organ transplant is one of the few situations in the western world where true resource scarcity exists: there are far fewer organs available than patients who need them. This leads to a natural competition, where only the fittest, most committed individuals who represent the best chances at success get selected for a transplant. I believe that western culture does not, in general, have resource scarcity issues, and so, western culture is mostly a matriarchy (its in the process of changing into one). This was something I observed in organ transplant patient after patient when I was on dialysis: one of the biggest reasons why people fail and stay on dialysis forever is that they think its a waiting list and that you just wait until your number is called. That's not how it works, its a competition, and if you're not taking care of yourself and doing everything you should be doing, the doctors won't think you're a good bet for a transplant and your number will never get called. That mindset tells me that people are used to dealing with matriarchal social norms by default, and they struggle when things become patriarchal because they aren't used to it.

I think the reason why Patriarchy dominates during times of resource scarcity is because evolution needs an optimal way to distribute scarce resources and competition (the essence of patriarchy, really, every other thing about it flows from that) is that optimal way, that is why societies with resource scarcity become Patriarchal by their nature: any other choice is sub-optimal. In such societies, religion is dominant, alpha male strongmen rule the society and women are subservient to men. There is no moral component to this, its neither right nor wrong, it is simply nature finding an optimal means of resource distribution. Its evolution by natural selection, nothing more.

On the other hand, I think the essence of the way women allocate resources (collaborative and communal) is optimal in times of resource abundance. When there are more resources available in society than every person in that society requires to sustain themselves, competition for those resources can become pointless (it still might be required if the resources are clustered in a small group of people) and, at that point, the optimal way to ensure the society as a whole survives and thrives is for those resources to be distributed across the population as evenly as possible.

That way, if another society, without an abundance of resources, attacks of invades (always a possibility) the matriarchal society will have an optimal number of fit and healthy soldiers, ready to repel the attack. Matriarchy sees the gradual erosion of male power within the society: with an abundance of resources consistently and reliably available, the primary role of men in society (protectors and providers) diminishes in proportion. At an inflection point, women gain real power in society's affairs (women's suffrage; note how the poorest nations in the world also are the ones where women can't vote or hold positions of power?) and as the resource abundance continues to grow, the power of women continues to grow over men.

In the US, 53% of the electorate in the last presidential election were women, women for the first time in the nation's history last year, controlled a majority of the nation's wealth, and colleges and universities now award women 3 college degrees to every 2 they award to a man. As our society continues to accumulate resources, all of these trajectories will continue on their current path. As things continue, support for the welfare state will become a point of bi-partisan consensus in the US, just as it is in Europe and Canada. The US's presidential system and separation of powers has slowed down the welfare state expansion by needing more than a simple majority to make changes, but the system can only slow things down for so long, the long range trend is inevitable. Please note: I make no moral judgment about this either. If Patriarchy is simply evolution adopting an optimally efficient way to distribute scarce resources, then matriarchy is simply evolution adopting an optimally efficient way to distribute abundant resources. Neither is right or wrong, good or bad, both simply are nature's way, neither is any more morally wrong than a storm or an earthquake.

I believe most civilizations on this earth are still patriarchal due to most civilizations on this earth still having to deal with resource scarcity issues. However, Europe, Canada and Australia are already heavily matriarchal. The US is titling heavily that way and will inevitably follow the rest of the western world. The future for the west is that we all become Japan. For various reasons, the effects of a cultural shift from patriarchy to matriarchy are far more rapid and more pronounced in Japan than they are other places. The Japanese demographic time bomb is our future: nature abhors a vacuum, and nature abhors a species that is too successful as much as it abhors one that is not successful enough. A species that is too successful has no reason to change, no reason to grow, no reason to evolve, and becomes stagnant. All it takes is one change in the environment or the rise of one new competitor, and a species that is too successful becomes extinct. Keep in mind that, in the history of this planet, our species has been the most successful, but our sample size is small (that is, we've been around less than 400,000 years, when the dinosaurs ruled this world for many millions of years) and the next 30 (or choose any sufficiently large number) most successful species in the history of this world that are behind us on that list all share one thing in common, they are all currently extinct.

Our society is about to reach another point; never before have we had the technology to avert our own potential extinction. If we take the problem seriously (and I'm not talking about climate change) our technology does show the capacity to change our environment and potentially free us of evolution's cold dead grip. We need to find a way to continue to grow and to change, as we grow wealthier and have ever more abundant resources and have increasingly longer life spans and increasingly little reason to change. In the past, this was simple, because in the past, our ancestors faced competition from other advanced hominid species (Homo Sapiens are not the only advanced hominids with language and tools, that this earth has ever been home to, in the distant past, there were neanderthal man and Homo Erectus) but that has not been the case for over 17,000 years now, and probably closer to 40,000 years now. Technology solved the problem of extinction by Patriarchy, it gave us control of our environment and allowed to extract far more resources from it than before, now it has to solve the problem of matriarchy.

TL;DR - I know nobody read my entire post, and that I just wasted time in my life I'll never get back. Oh well.

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quotient_is · 2017-07-13T18:28:51+00:00

I perceive the patriarchy to be the remnants of the old school western Judeo-Christian tradition. If you examine highly traditional (especially Evangelical) Christian sects, you will still see teachings about gendered spheres of influence, purity obsession, male superiority in the eyes of god, etc.

This line of thinking is receding, and I do believe that is partially because of the work of feminism and/or female equality in the traditionally male sphere. It's also partially because of advances in technology, proliferation of information and abundance of resources.

Then again, dominionists raise their children from a young age to gain political power for the glorification of the Judeo-Christian god. Their literal goal is to change secular law to be more like biblical law and they are soooooooooo good at gaining political power. These sorts of movements aim to reinstate a patriarchal society, and that's concerning.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominion_Theology

pinkgoldrose · 2017-07-14T00:01:47+00:00

Men make most of the decisions. In this sub we hear men complain that since women have gotten the right to vote, we're doomed to live in a rotten female-dominated society. As far as I know, no one took away the men's vote. As long as both men and women can vote, it doesn't make sense to say that our society is now "female-dominated". What these men who complain consider a "female-dominated" society is actually a society where men and women both get a chance to be affect decisions, but since these men's idea of a "neutral" society is one ruled by men, they will call anything that isn't ruled by men a "female-dominated" society. They are stuck in the past. Right now men and women can vote, but men still occupy most of the decision-making positions. When the decision-making positions are split equally between genders, then we will be able to say we no longer live in a patriarchy.

But attitudes also need to change for the patriarchy to end. Attitudes have long been dictated by men. Things have come a long way in some parts of the world. Things are lagging behind in other parts of the world. To see what are these "attitudes" I talk about, check this post (https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/6mv93p/what_aspects_of_a_womans_life_are_most_men/dk4whvt/) by a Turkish woman. She says men assume she can't have technical expertise or knowledge because she is a woman. They insist on speaking with a man instead of her. They push her around more than they would if she were a man.

LSTW1234 · 2017-07-12T22:43:35+00:00

what actual patriarchal conditions exist

Men overwhelmingly hold positions of power

what actual changes would mean that neither gender is privileged over the other?

Women holding more positions of power

Title	What social/economic conditions support the existence of a patriarchy and what changes would signal its end?
Author	sweet_samsara
Upvotes	3
Comments	65
Date	July 12, 2017 9:55 PM UTC (9 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/PurplePillDebate
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/PurplePillDebate/comments/6mx9fn/what_socialeconomic_conditions_support_the/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/PurplePillDebate/what-socialeconomic-conditions-support-the.267017 https://theredarchive.com/post/267017

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