Amos's River of Justice

Category: Patriarchy

Various degrees of patriarchal social and political organization have existed in different societies throughout history. However, it can be argued that the natural tendency in human societies is patriarchal. In subsequent articles I will argue that some human societies deliberately modified this tendency, while others emphasized it.

  • Steve Bannon is a Pretend Traditionalist

    I recently found a key date that confirms my suspicions about Steve Bannon’s so-called Traditionalism.  I’ve long suspected that Bannon isn’t a real traditionalist. To be clear, Bannon is not a real traditionalist in the same sense that Donald Trump was never a real candidate.  Bannon piggy-backed on this conversation in the same way that Donald Trump piggy-backed on Bernie’s campaign.  We know Trump had no constituents when he started.  He had to hire actors to attend his first rallies. Steve Bannon is a pretend Traditionalist. He’s just trying to give depth and meaning to his audacious power-grab.

    Teitelbaum’s Book Probably Gives Bannon Too Much Credit

    In his book about Steve Bannon and the populist right, The Return of Traditionalism and the Rise of the Populist Right, 1 Benjamin R. Teitelbaum says he first became aware of Bannon’s Traditionalism in 2016. On the one hand, he gives Bannon too much credit as a traditionalist. But I’m comparing Bannon’s version to the Traditionalism of the early twentieth century. It’s always had authoritarian tendencies, but it used to have a coherent worldview.  He’s right as far as he goes–as an ideology it has shed its coherent worldview and lost much of its luster. All that’s left is its claim to authority.

    Amid startling political gains for nationalist, anti-immigrant forces in the twenty-first century, Traditionalists on the right appeared to be carrying on with a fantasy role-playing game-like Dungeons & Dragons for racists…It was the sort of thing that “serious,” practical-minded activists on the radical right fled from as they charged toward burgeoning political opportunities and the chance to brand themselves as viable leaders.

    Teitelbaum goes on to describe his surprise that ‘an individual with such remarkable power and influence’ (Steve Bannon) had been recorded name-dropping Traditionalism’s key figures (like Rene Guenon).  He couldn’t believe someone like Bannon would even know about Traditionalism.

    What is Bannon Really Up To?

    Teitelbaum was right the first time.  Steve Bannon fits his definition of a typical Traditionalist on the right. However, Bannon represents its modern guise. He has no ideas of his own so he uses Traditionalism as a cloak.  He’s really a hyperactive trickster whose first impulse in 2016 was to steal the show.

    At the Least, Traditionalism Deserves to Be Correctly Represented as a Historical Phenomenon

    I’ve been talking about Rene Guenon since 2015. I wrote What Does Theology Have to do with Life? in March of 2015.  I wrote Transgender Rights, Same-Sex Marriage and Women in November of 2015.  I wrote Can We Talk About Patriarchy? in May of 2016.

    We would do well to ignore the piggy-backers and freeloaders on the conversation.

  • Patriarchy Weakens Participation by Women

    There is a contradiction between progressives defending democratic principles, and proponents of the traditional family.  This conflict is not limited to the well-known dispute between the Democratic Party and Conservatives in Congress.  The problem is much older and far-reaching than that, as illustrated in this article by Chandrakala Padia.  She concludes that when it comes to feminist issues there is not much difference between  liberal theory and the elitist model of democracy. The theorists all assume that the structure of social relations and inequality has no effect on political equality and democratic citizenship.  I would argue that patriarchy weakens participation by women and strengthens oligarchy.

    Western Women and the Specter of a Traditional Standard

    Today, after 200 years of women’s ‘liberation’, the issue is further clouded by the fact that Western women are held to the traditional standard in more subtle ways.  It has been argued that the failure to account for the structural difficulties women face in political participation has crippled the development of democracy.  Today, as members of Congress strive to return women to more traditional roles, this is a serious problem for democracy.  Chandrakala Padia’s article is a good way to begin this discussion.

    Theoretical Models of Democracy

    Padia states that current political practices are the result of four theoretical models of democracy.  The participatory model of democracy, attributed to J. J. Rousseau, is the last of four models, but in her opinion it is the most hopeful model for the democratic citizen.  The other three theoretical models will be discussed following the discussion of the participatory model. They are: the Protective model of Bentham and J. S. Mill; the Developmental model of J. S. Mill; and the Elitist model of Joseph Schumpeter.

    The Participatory/developmental Theory of Democracy

    The participatory/developmental theory is my category, not Padia’s.  I’m trying to lessen the confusion of J. S. Mill being categorized under two of the models: Mill developed both the protective model of democracy with Jeremy Bentham, and Rousseau’s classical participatory model.  (For Padia, ‘classical’ refers to a model that retains its moral content.  By comparison, she says the elitist model has been emptied of its moral content.)

    J. S. Mill

    J. S. Mill agreed with the protective model of Bentham but he valued participation more than Bentham.  Padia calls his model the developmental model of democracy.  Mill differs from Bentham in the following way: for Bentham, participation only ensured that private interests of each citizen were protected.  But for Mill participation had a much wider function.  It is central for the maintenance of a democratic polity and a participatory society.  So Mill advocates for adult franchise (including female franchise).  He thinks subordination of one sex to another is wrong in itself and hinders human improvement.  Therefore, it should be replaced by perfect equality.

    However, Mill also agrees with Rousseau on the social inferiority of women.  He assumed that wives would always be willing to accept the ‘natural’ arrangements, and failed to see sources of male authority over women outside of legal forms, such as economic authority.  He ended up promoting liberty in the political realm and subjugation at home.  In Mill’s model, patriarchy weakens participation by women and strengthens oligarchy.  He disguises his patriarchal bias by separating the private and public lives of women.

    The Patriarchal Influence of Plato, Aristotle, and Hegel

    One explanation for this is that both Mill and Rousseau use the patriarchal logic of Plato, Aristotle, and Hegel.  These men believed that men by nature possess capacities required for citizenship and justice, while women by nature lack such political morality.  For Mill this is a contradiction, because he also argued that individuals develop a sense of justice through participation in a wide range of public institutions.  It would be more logical if he had called for women to develop their sense of ‘political morality’ through participation.

    According to Padia, “the inadequacies of Mill’s analysis arise from his support for the public private dichotomy.  He tries to adorn woman with all political rights, but deprives her of equal status in the family…”

    The most charitable excuse that can be made for Mill’s patriarchal bias is the dogmatic influence of the Greek philosophers.  In spite of their oligarchical leanings, their writings have become the undisputed foundation of what passes for reason, even in societies that call themselves democratic.  This is not rational.  Patriarchy weakens participation by women and strengthens oligarchy.

    J. J. Rousseau

    Rousseau’s indifference to women is also in conflict with his own theory.

    Rousseau expects individuals to develop a sense of responsibility through the participatory process.  He is convinced that, as a result of participating in decision-making, the individual can be educated to distinguish between his own good and bad impulses and desires, and to harmonize the two states of public and private citizenship.  Further Rousseau finds a close connection between participation and control; for the more a man participates the more control he gets over the political process.  And it is here that one can see the true meaning of freedom.  For unless each individual is forced, through participation, into socially responsible action, there can be no law which ensures everyone’s freedom.

    But then he argues that women’s distinct position and functions are those that are natural to her sex.  He justifies the absolute rule of men over their wives, the confinement of women to their home after marriage, and a strict moral education for women, so that family life may not be disturbed by transgressions.

    The entire education of women must be relative to men.  To please them, to be useful to them, to be loved and honored by them, to rear them when they are young, to care for them when they are grown up, to counsel and console, to make their lives pleasant and charming, these are the duties of women at all times and they should be taught them in their childhood…

    Misogyny and its Antidote

    Rousseau even promotes the idea that the female sex is the source of major evils in the civilized world.  Like Mill, he contradicts the essence of his own theories of democracy.  These contradictions should be the focus of democrats going forward.

    If Patriarchy weakens participation by women and strengthens oligarchy, the recognition and elimination of patriarchal attitudes in democratic theory would begin to address this tendency toward oligarchy.  Padia thinks there is reason for hope in a new type of democratic theorist:

    Thus we find that both Rousseau and Mill accept the patriarchal suppression of civil liberty, and look on domestic life as having no bearing at all on public life which is one of the many defects of the participatory model.  But, I hasten to add, this cannot be said of political philosophers like Carole Pateman, who are also proponents of participatory democracy.

    Carole Pateman

    According to Pateman, the concept of participatory democracy comprises three ideas:

    1.  “Individuals and their institutions cannot be considered in isolation from one another.” for we may add the improvement of an individual importantly depends on his membership of a wider whole.  Indeed, says Pateman, what is required is the maximum participation of people in all spheres of society; for it would on the one hand help in developing individual talent, and, on the other, lend richness and variety to the fabric of participatory society.
    2. “Spheres such as industry should be seen as political systems in their own right, offering areas of participation [in] addition to the national level”.  And here the authority structure should be so organized that maximum workers may participate in decision-making.  This would slowly lead to the abolition of the permanent distinction between the owners and the owned.
    3. Participation means not only taking part in elections, but also having an effective voice in the making of decisions.  it also means that people have the power to change their own decisions if they do not yield the desired results.

    One Democratic Ideal is Still Missing: Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity

    Even though these points provide key features of democracy, Chandrakala Padia finds that an important component is still missing.  Participation should be regulated by the three cardinal ideals of democracy–liberty, equality, and fraternity.

    A mere extension of the range of participation does not guarantee that the working together is making for a desirable goal.

    Still, Padia gives Pateman the credit for insisting on the ideal of sexual equality.  She asserts that neither the equal opportunity of liberalism, nor the active participatory democratic citizenship of one and all can be achieved without radical changes in personal and domestic life.

    Basic Tenets and Theorists of the Elitist Model

    Most writers today adhere to the elitist model of democracy.  This is where the cumulative effects of the patriarchal bias, and the oligarchical structures that arise from it, become apparent.  The basic tenets of the elitist model can be stated as:

    1. It’s the leaders who really matter and not the masses they lead.  Michels says the majority are ‘predestined by tragic necessity to submit to dominion of a small minority, and must be content to constitute the pedestal of oligarchy’.
    2. Democracy is merely a method for arriving at political, administrative, and legislative decisions, and is hence incapable of being an end in itself.
    3. Active participation of the people leads to totalitarianism. Schumpeter says, “Party and machine politicians are simply the response to the fact that the electoral mass is incapable of action other than a stampede…”  The people, Sartori says, only ‘react’, they do not ‘act’.  Therefore it would be wiser to accept the facts as they are, because trying to change them would endanger the very stability of the political system.

    Stability is Emphasized by Elitist Theorists

    Stability is emphasized by elitist theorists.  According to Schumpeter, stability comes from the long-lasting nature of political loyalties, and flexibility comes from the fact that it’s the elite who wield the power in a democracy.  They are supposedly able to overcome any threats to the system by virtue of their superior intellectual gifts.

    Joseph Schumpeter

    The main proponent of the elitist model is Joseph Schumpeter, who wrote Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy in 1942.  Mosca, Michels, and Sartori also support this theory.  This model contends that the classical (moral) model rested on  empirically unrealistic foundations.  It asserts that democracy can never lead to the improvement of mankind, and that participation has hardly any value in itself.  The purpose of democracy is simply to register the desires of people as they are, not to contribute to their ennoblement.

    Democracy is simply a kind of market mechanism: ‘the voters are the consumers; the politicians are the entrepreneurs’.  The role of people is merely to produce a government, not to ensure that it be efficient and right-minded.  According to Schumpeter: “…the democratic method is that institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions in which individuals acquire the power to decide by means of a competitive struggle for the people’s vote”.

    Bernard Barelson

    According to Barelson, classical theory concentrated on individual citizens and ignored the political system. It did not realize that limited participation and apathy have a positive function for the system.

    Robert Dahl

    Robert Dahl thinks classical theory is invalid and inadequate for his own theory of polyarchy, or the rule of multiple minorities. Following Schumpeter, he says democracy is a political method that centers on the electoral process. Elections are central in providing a mechanism that controls leaders by non-leaders. He says political equality must not be defined as equality of political control or power for lower socio-economic status groups. Political equality means universal suffrage. But he warns of dangers in increased participation by ordinary man. It could lead to polyarchy and decrease stability.

    Giovanni Sartori

    Giovanni Sartori, who wrote Democratic Theory in 1942, said there is an unbridgeable gap between ‘classical’ theory and reality. He claims the democratic ideal (the ideal of leveling) works against democracy and participation leads to totalitarianism. He recommends not trying to increase participation. Power resides in those who avail themselves of it.

    Harry Eckstein

    Eckstein said that we must understand the nature of non-governmental social relationships in families, schools, economic organization, etc.  He claims that you can’t democratize some authority structures such as socialization in school and family, and some capitalist organizations. They resist change and therefore add to stability.

    Participation for the majority is the participation in the choice of decision-makers. The function is protective and protects individuals from arbitrary decisions by elected leaders. This justifies the democratic method, in his view.

    Conclusion

    The entire body of democratic theory leans toward oligarchy.  This tendency has been disguised, even by the defenders of participation.  In retrospect, the rise of the elitist model seems inevitable.  This model does not limit itself to the supposed flaws of women; it is hostile to the participation of both sexes.

    Many of the tactics we saw in the 2016 and 2020 elections, as well as the insulting attitudes about progressive goals, can be explained by the party establishment’s acceptance of the elitist model.  Patriarchy weakens participation by women and strengthens oligarchy.  The remedy is a participatory model of democracy as represented by Carole Pateman and other feminist theorists.  However, its effectiveness would depend on whether we are able to  restructure social relations in the home.

    American Democracy Owes a Debt to Indigenous Americans

  • Plato’s War on Women

    The foundation of the ancient Greeks’ project for civilization was to turn the female sex into a subject population.  But there were unintended consequences. This article argues that there is a connection between Plato’s war on women and the end of monarchy.

    Philo

    We have evidence that the Greeks were toying with the idea of subjecting women before Plato, but it was Plato who influenced Philo, the Hellenistic Jewish philosopher born in 25 BC who used allegory to harmonize Jewish scripture, mainly the Torah, with Greek philosophy.   If we were to judge Plato by today’s standards for hate speech we would conclude that he was a hater of women.  However we don’t judge Plato or any other misogynist by that standard.  One reason the world accepts Plato’s animosity toward women is that Philo enshrined it in the Bible’s creation story.

    Aristotle

    This story led some religious leaders to conclude that nothing is due women for their role in reproduction because they are merely repaying their debt to God.  This seems to have been the goal of Plato’s student Aristotle who added his own special touch by denying women credit for their part in the creation of life.  (This points to the importance of childbearing in the status of women.)  The suspicion that certain influential men claimed God as a partisan gendered being with the sole aim of ruling will be disturbing for many readers, but for those of us who want to defend biblical religion there is an escape from that conclusion.

    The Bible

    There are three ways to read the story of the Fall of Man.  It can be read as a model for the way society should work; as a description of the way things are; or as warning or a prediction about a human tendency.  The second and third possibilities are more revealing than Plato could have imagined. That is, revealing of patriarchal intention. These possibilities are never used to interpret the Fall of Man, although they are used to interpret other biblical stories.  The Tower of Babel for example is interpreted as an explanation for different languages and a warning against hubris.  Likewise, it is ironic how well the story of the Fall of Man describes human behavior, regardless how we choose to interpret it.

    Customs that Guard Against the Subjection of Women

    It’s likely that human societies have always had some degree of patriarchal authority.  However ancient cultures purposely remedied the disadvantages of women.  For example, according to the biblical creation story, inequality between men and women is established in marriage. In ancient times this protection was accomplished through customs involving the extended family.

    Bride Wealth

    The fundamental understanding of ancient cultures was the value of children (and their mother) to the marriage and to the extended family.  This value was acknowledged in various ways.  One was the custom of bride wealth.   Another was the dowry. (Hardship can lead to a breakdown in this custom. In some parts of the world today the dowry is used to justify abuse against women).

    Matrilineal Kinship

    Another custom that has been shown to benefit women and their children is matrilineal kinship.  This is a system in which lineage and inheritance are traced through women.

    The structure of matrilineal kinship systems implies that, relative to patrilineal kinship systems, women have greater support from their own kin groups and husbands have less authority over their wives.  ((Sara Lowes, Matrililneal Kinship and Spousal Cooperation: Evidence from the Matrilineal Belt, Stanford University and CIFAR, 25 February 2020)).

    Sara Lowes tested the hypothesis that matrilineal kinship systems reduce spousal cooperation and found that men and women from matrilineal ethnic groups cooperate less with their spouses in a lab experiment.  However she also found that matrilineal kinship has important benefits for the well-being of women and children.  The children of matrilineal women are healthier and better educated, and matrilineal women experience less domestic violence and greater autonomy.

    Matrilineal kinship is not only a remedy for the inequality of women in marriage (Lowes didn’t measure for the effect of bride wealth or bride price), I believe it was the original system for royal succession in Egypt.  I base this on the tendency of pharaohs to marry their sisters.  Marriage to sisters was not a natural part of matrilineal succession.  It was a way for an ambitious pharaoh to escape the limits of matrilineal succession, which makes it impossible to form dynasties.  The only way around this obstacle would have been for the son of a pharaoh to wed an heiress.  However even this would have gone against custom, if not law.   Furthermore, succession by the offspring of a sister (the daughter of the former pharaoh) probably broke the law as well.  Normally the son of a pharaoh’s daughter would not have been eligible to succeed him.

    This patriarchal strategy can be demonstrated in other countries besides Egypt.  The Achaean invader Menelaus married Helen, a kidnapped heiress, because without her he had no right to be king.  That’s why Helen’s rescue by Paris led to the Trojan War ((J. F. del Giorgio, The Oldest Europeans, A. J. Place, Caracas, Venezuela, 2006)).

    Finally, Patrilineal systems inevitably lead to a narrowing of the gene pool for succession.  This narrowing of the gene pool has played out in the lineage of European kings.  This breakdown in the system of royal succession points to a departure from ancient custom and law.

    Plato’s Anti-Democratic Focus

    Plato did not only weaken the monarchal ideal. His writings are anti-democratic. Patriarchy weakens participation by women.

  • The Misogyny Suburb

    Some time ago it occurred to me that my earnest attempts to correct misogynistic notions are based on a misunderstanding. I thought misogynists were not aware of the facts. But when it comes to the battle of the sexes, the facts are not all that important. They are not even the point. Misogyny is an article of faith. A case in point is the imaginary misogyny suburb discussed by Rebecca Solnit in Harpers Magazine. It may be futile, but I will always have sympathy for those who insist on stating the facts.  That’s what Solnit did in her article, Shooting Down Man the Hunter.

    “Sooner or later in conversations about who we are, who we have been, and who we can be, someone will tell a story about Man the Hunter. It’s a story not just about Man but about Woman and Child too. There are countless variants, but all of them go something like this: In primordial times men went out and hunted and brought home meat to feed women and children, who sat around being dependent on them. In most versions, the story is set in nuclear units, such that men provide only for their own family, and women have no community to help with the kids. In every version, women are baggage that breeds.

    “Though it makes claims about human societies as they existed 200,000 or 5 million years ago, the story itself isn’t so old. Whatever its origins, it seems to have reached a peak of popularity only in the middle of last century…”

    This version of human history traces the dominant socioeconomic arrangements of the late Fifties and early Sixties back to the origins of our species. Therefore, Solnit calls it the story of the 5-million-year-old suburb. 2

    Patriarchy is an Article of Faith.

    In the past I thought the facts mattered. So, I walked into Wikipedia’s Patriarchy article and wasted years of my life. My arguments against the nonsensical claims and unfair tactics of unidentified editors changed nothing.

    Now I know better. I have learned for example that while human evolution may not have progressed the way the sociobiologists say it did, everything they say is ‘true’. What’s more, it has always been ‘true’. And last but not least, it always will be ‘true’. Sociobiology is a scientific remake of the Adam and Eve story.

    Misogyny in the Art World

    The Nation Magazine recently published an article about Sonia Terk. 3 I knew her from Albert Gleizes’s 4 biography as Sonia Delaunay. I hadn’t realized she was Jewish, but according to David Cottington (cited below), just being female would have been enough of a handicap among the French avant-garde.

    One of the changes that took place in the French art business was the appearance in the mid-1890s of sufficient numbers of buyers to make speculation in, and collection of, contemporary art feasible. At first, interest was limited to established artists but the entrance of American collectors like Morgan, Rockefeller and Whitney led to a rise in the cost of impressionist paintings and eventually to increased interest in post-impressionist work. This gave legitimacy to neoimpressionists and nabis. Prices for these works were too high for many collectors, but they encouraged a speculative interest at the lower end of the contemporary market, in the work of young, unorthodox or unknown – but invariably male – artists.

    A Separate Critical Category for Women Artists: Femmes Peintres

    In response to the growing number of women studying and practicing art around 1900, (Terk studied at the Palette) a new critical category was added: femmes peintres. Their work was perceived to carry ‘feminine’ aesthetic sensibilities and interests. As one critic helpfully put into words, the works of females threatened to become a plague, a fearful confusion, and a terrifying stream of mediocrity’. This attitude was a direct result of the construction of artistic identity in terms of masculinity. The idea of individualism, the belief in the autonomy of genius, mastery over the city and its urban spaces, were all seen as male prerogatives. The fantasy was the earthy but poetic male whose life is organized around his instinctual needs. 7

    It’s a sociobiological-feminist apology for fossil fuels!

  • Propaganda in Turkey

    The problem with a conversation like this one is that it’s easy to get drawn into hit-and-miss analyses of foreign policy. You try to resist the temptation, but once in a while a headline comes along that’s impossible to ignore–like the one about ‘young Turks’ protesting in the streets of Ankara. https://www.gulf-times.com/story/356371/youths-seek-greater-liberty-not-revolution.  Whose idea was that headline? You assume that, whoever came up with it, Prime Minister Erdogan wouldn’t appreciate such propaganda in Turkey.

    In 1908, a group called the Young Turks helped bring down the Ottoman Empire. They also helped Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and his secular government come to power.

    This train of thought would remind you that the neocons think of secularism as insurance against Islamization, and that they prefer a secular government for Turkey. This is troubling because Kemal’s Turkey was full of racist nationalism, not unlike the rest of Europe before World War I.6

    However, if there’s one thing I’ve learned while trying to educate myself about American foreign policy, it’s that there’s no single faction you can blame for the world’s problems. No matter which one happens to be in charge, good intentions and honorable behavior are mixed in with sheer madness. And even though the U.S. is having its way with the world at this time, America isn’t the sole cause of the world’s problems. To find the true cause, you need a longer timeframe.

    Is There a Cure for US Policy?

    It has been suggested that the cure for U.S. policy is to develop an intellectual tradition to rival the neocons. This is probably a good idea. Unfortunately all ideas are not equal. For the last 30 years, the neocons’ ideas have been well-funded by military and government contracts and transnational corporations. They have also been promoted by a captive media. Competing ideas won’t have that kind of support, regardless of their quality. For that reason, I recommend beginning the discussion by diagnosing the disease, rather than treating the symptoms. Current ideas are one of the symptoms.

    Less Inequality

    In a nutshell, our inheritance and real estate laws funnel wealth to an elite minority and allow a widening gap between the rich and the poor. Some would say patrilineal inheritance favors men, but it doesn’t really. Patrilineal inheritance allows a society’s wealth to be drained away in frivolous pursuits such as war. Matrilineal inheritance, on the other hand, preserves the property of mothers and thereby benefits entire families. In addition, the ‘usufruct‘ 8 of a woman’s inheritance can be used by her father and/or husband for a limited time.

    The usufruct is the ‘legal right accorded to a person or party that confers the temporary right to use and derive income or benefit from someone else’s property. Usufruct is usually conferred for a limited time period or until death. While the usufructuary has the right to use the property, he or she cannot damage or destroy it, or dispose of the property.’

    Matrilineal Inheritance Benefits Everyone

    My point: matrilineal inheritance benefits everyone without depleting a society’s wealth. It also protects its property from those who would wage war and monopolize industry.

    But of course, that’s why matrilineal inheritance is always the first thing to go. Misogyny helps the process along by misogyny, and the Judeo-Christian story of the Fall of Man justifies it in the West. It is entirely illegitimate, but those who benefit will never give it up without a fight. Still, it’s good to know that our current problem is not as complicated as the ideas that shore it up: Mothers are impoverished and subjugated while a small cadre of powerful men use their inheritance to impose misery on the human race. The tail is wagging the dog.

    Ideas are important. However, once the wealth of the land becomes vulnerable to a good argument there will be no end to good arguments. Change the laws first; correct the ideas at your leisure.

    See also: Onan and the Patriarchal Agenda

    and: Adam, Noah and the Snake-King

  • Western Patriarchy

    This was written for the Wikipedia article.  Much of it was deleted in a dispute.  

    Patriarchy is a social system in which the father or eldest male is head of the household, having authority over women and children. Patriarchy also refers to a system of government by males, and to the dominance of men in social or cultural systems. It may also include title being traced through the male line. (Webster’s New World College Dictionary)

    Within feminist theory, patriarchy refers to the structure of modern cultural and political systems, which are ruled by men. Such systems are said to be detrimental to the rights of women. However, it has been noted that patriarchal systems of government do not benefit all men of all classes.

    While the term patriarchy generally refers to institutions, the term is sometimes used less effectively in describing societal attitudes. It has been argued, “Institutions are very persistent and may last, with little change, into a period in which attitudes have altered considerably since the institutions were devised.” Gordon Rattray Taylor used the words “patrist” and “matrist” to describe attitudes (as opposed to institutions), and noted that the outlook of the dominant social group seems to swing between the two extremes. however, the patrist assertion that the patriarchal system of authority was the original and universal system of social organization inevitably leads to the establishment of corresponding institutions.(Taylor, Gordon Rattray. Theories of Matriarchy and Patriarchy. Sex in History )

    History

    Aristotle

    In the third century BC, Aristotle taught that the city-state developed out of the patriarchal family, although he thought the two were different in kind as well as in scale (Lock, John, “Two Treatises of Government, with a supplement Patriarcha by Robert Filmer, edited with an introduction by Thomas I. Cook, New York. Hafner Press, 1947). He wrote that the highest form of human community is the political community. In the Politics, Aristotle attempts to illustrate the nature of the hierarchies that exist in the political community and its subordinate communities. He argues for an origin of male rule. In Chapter Thirteen he states that men and women have different kinds of virtue, “just as those who are natural subjects differ (from those who rule by nature.)” Other types of community, such as the household, are subordinate and inferior to the polis. Aristotle proposed that the household is subordinate to the political community because the aim of life in the household is the mere preservation of life, or the satisfaction of life’s daily needs, whereas the aim of membership in the political community is to live well. He also proposed that the household is inferior to the political community in the character of its rule. In the household, the man rules by virtue of his age and sex, monarchically at best and tyrannically at worst, while in the polis, citizens choose their rulers on the basis of merit. (Stauffer, Dana Jalbert Aristotle’s Account of the Subjection of Women

    Socrates

    Both Plato and Aristotle seem to have followed the lead of Socrates, who denied that citizens had the basic virtue necessary to nurture a good society and equated virtue with knowledge unattainable by ordinary people. During Athens’ struggle with undemocratic Sparta, Socrates favored Sparta (Linder, Doug, The Trial of Socrates).

    Plato

    Plato never mentioned Socrates’ sedition against Athens, but the cosmology of the Timaeus includes the idea that a man who lives well will live a happy and congenial life on his consort star. Failing this his second birth will be as a woman. (41E-42D, on the Creation of Souls).

    The Athenians and the Egyptians Compared

    Other ancient societies contemporary with Aristotle, as well as many Athenians, did not share these views of women, family organization, or political and economic structure (del Giorgio, J.F. The Oldest Europeans. Guadeamus, Caracas, Venezuela, 2003). Egypt left no philosophical record, but Herodotus left a record of his shock at the contrast between the roles of Egyptian women and the women of Athens. He observed that they attended market and were employed in trade. In ancient Egypt a middle-class woman might sit on a local tribunal, engage in real estate transactions, and inherit or bequeath property. Women also secured loans, and witnessed legal documents. Greek influence spread, however, with the conquests of Alexander the Great, who was educated by Aristotle (Bristow, John Temple. “What Paul Really said about Women: an Apostle’s liberating views on equality in marriage, leadership, and love”, Harper Collins, New York, 1991). Eventually, when Alexander wanted to unite his two empires in equality, Aristotle was adamant that all non-Greeks should be enslaved.

    Aristotle and the Jews

    About 200 BC the Jewish Philosopher Aristobulus of Panaeas claimed that Jewish revelation and Aristotelian philosophy were identical. Before another 200 years had passed it was said that Aristotle derived his doctrine directly from Judaism. In the 12th century Aristotlianism was harmonized with Judaism by the Talmudist, philosopher and astronomer, Maimonides. Subsequent rabbinical thought includes such pronouncements as “Eve was not created simultaneously with Adam because God foreknew that later she would be a source of complaint. (Gen. R. xvii), and “Nine curses together with death befell Eve in consequence of her disobedience” (Pirke R. E. Xiv.; Ab. R.N. ii. 42). While Maimonides dared to contradict Aristotle’s ideas in matters of faith, it wasn’t long before the Islamic Philosopher Averroes, endorsed them without reserve. Aristotle in Jewish Legend

    The Christians

    For the last 1800 years Christian leaders have placed great emphasis on the creation of Eve, believing that the story was historical fact, rather than androcentric myth. Combined with the account of the Fall in Genesis, Chapter 3, it has been used as evidence of insurmountable character defects, not just for Eve but for all women. In the 2nd century Tertullian, the son of a centurion and a pagan until middle life, told women believers, “Do you not know that you are Eve?…Because of the death which you brought upon us, even the Son of God had to die” (De cultu feminarum, libri duo I, 1).

    In the 4th Century, the basic attitude was one of puzzlement over the seemingly incongruous fact of woman’s existence. Augustine of Hippo said he could not see how a woman could be any help for a man if the work of childbearing is excluded. However, it was only with Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century that Aristotle’s teachings emerged in the official teachings of Roman Catholicism. Aristotle’s assertion that women are misbegotten males can be found in the Summa Theologica, I 92 I ad 1. The influence of combining Aristotle’s theory with Biblical interpretations can’t be overestimated.

    Christine de Pizan on the Christian Canon

    In about 1404 Christine de Pizan wrote “Le livre de la cite des dames”, a systematic feminist treatise arguing against the misogyny in classical works and the Christian Canon. After the advent of printing, the discourse became known as “the Querelle des femmes” and continued for the next 400 years.

    Sir Robert Filmer and the Divine Right of Kings

    From the time of Martin Luther, Protestantism regularly used the commandment in Exodus 20:12 to justify the duties owed to all superiors. ‘Honor thy father,’ became a euphemism for the duty to obey the king. But it was primarily as a secular doctrine that Aristotle’s appeal took on political meaning. Although many 16th and 17th century theorists agreed with Aristotle’s views concerning the place of women in society, none of them tried to prove political obligation on the basis of the patriarchal family until sometime after 1680. The patriarchal political theory is associated primarily with Sir Robert Filmer. Sometime before 1653, Filmer completed a work entitled Patriarcha. In it he defended the divine right of kings as having title inherited from Adam, the first man of the human race, according to Judeo-Christian tradition.

    John Locke on Filmer

    In 1688 John Locke called Filmer’s all-powerful prince “…this strange kind of domineering phantom called the ‘fatherhood’ which, whoever could catch, presently got empire and unlimited, absolute power.” Locke asserted that if ‘honor thy father’, places everyone in subjection to political authority, then it couldn’t mean the duty owed to natural fathers, since they are subjects. By Filmer’s doctrine fathers have no power since power belongs solely to the prince. Locke also observed that those who propose political rights based on this commandment invariably omit the word ‘mother’ which is present in the Biblical verse. (His editor, however, made a note of Locke’s inconsistency in attributing natural law to the governance of relations between a father and his children, while stating that the law governing relations between a man and his wife is based on legality, or on Eve’s punishment after the Fall. Two Treatises of Government).

    Aristotle’s view, by Locke’s time elevated to an anthropological doctrine, was not weakened by this argument, and subsequent writers continued to give credence to Filmer’s views.

    Nineteenth Century Feminism

    In the 19th Century, Sarah Grimké dared to question the divine origin of the scriptures. Later, Elizabeth Caddy Stanton used Grimke’s criticism of Biblical sources to establish a basis for feminist thought. She published The Woman’s Bible, which proposed a feminist reading of the Old and New Testament. This tendency was enlarged by Feminist theory which denounced the patriarchal Judeo-Christian tradition. (Castro, Ginette. American Feminism: a contemporary history. New York University Press. 1990)

    Theosophy, Evolution and Racism: Patriarchy at its Worst

    In Europe, from about 1770, the rationalist Enlightenment and the desire for mystery had brought about a resurgence of a synthesis of Gnosticism, neoplatonism and kabbalistic theosophy. This particular version arose first in the utilitarian and industrial countries of America and England, with the theosophy of Madame Helena Blavatsky. This had a profound impact in Germany where it fit into the lebenzreform movement. It is likely that Adolf Hitler was influenced by Blavatsky through the writings of Guido von List and Lanz von Liebenfels.

    List sought a chauvinistic mystique for the defense of Germandom against the liberal, socialist and Jewish political forces in the late Wilhelmine Era. His blueprint involved ruthless subjection of non-Aryans in a hierarchical state; qualification of candidates for education or positions in public service, as well as in professions and commerce, based on racial purity. All non-Aryans were to be slaves. His political principles included racial and marital laws, and a patriarchal society where only male heads had full majority and where only Ario-Germans had freedom and citizenship. Each family was to have a genealogical record, proving Aryan lineage. he proposed a new feudalism where only the first-born inherits. These ideas were published as early as 1911 and were similar to the Nuremberg Laws of 1935.

    Darwinist writers, who wrote of blond, blue-eyed Aryans, were influential in the writings of von Liebenfels. Von Liebenfels had illiberal, pan-German and monarchical sentiments. He believed the lower classes were inferior races and must be exterminated along with the weak. Socialism, democracy and feminism were his most important targets. Women were a special problem in his view because they were more prone to bestial lust. He advocated brood mothers in eugenic convents, sterilization and other practices that later influenced the Third Reich, apparent in Himmler’s anticipation of polygamy for his Schutzstaffel (SS), care of unmarried mothers in SS homes, and musings on the education and marriage of chosen women (Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan cults and their influence on Nazi ideology: the Ariosophists of Austria and Germany, 1890-1935, New York University Press. 1992).

    Romantics and Marxists

    By 1673, Francois Poullain de la Barre, “On the Equality of the Two Sexes”, had turned feminism into a systematic Enlightenment philosophy (as opposed to the previous Renaissance feminism).(Feminism) However, in 1861, Johann Jakob Bachofen, a German romantic and writer of the counter-Enlightenment said that matriarchy preceded patriarchy, and is superior to patriarchy on moral grounds. Bachofen influenced Karl Marx and Frederick Engles. Marxist analysis has been a basis for subsequent feminist thought. (Stjepan Gabriel Meštrović, Durkheim and postmodern culture. A. de Gruyter, New York. 1992) From the beginning, socialist feminists in France, for example, were challenged by the republic, which “oppressed them as workers and women; by Marxism, which ignores gender; and by the misogyny of their socialist brothers. This struggle continues within all parties of the left (History of Feminism).

  • Patriarchy

    This was written for the Wikipedia article.  Much of that article was deleted in a dispute.  

    What is Patriarchy?

    Patriarchy is a social system in which the father or eldest male is head of the household, having authority over women and children. Patriarchy also refers to a system of government by males, and to the dominance of men in social or cultural systems. It may also include tracing title through the male line (Webster’s New World College Dictionary). Feminist theory considers rule by men to be detrimental to the rights of women. However, patriarchal systems of government do not benefit all men of all classes.

    Patriarchal Institutions versus Patriarchal Attitudes

    The term patriarchy generally refers to institutions but the term is sometimes used for societal attitudes. It has been argued that “Institutions are very persistent and may last, with little change, into a period in which attitudes have altered considerably since the institutions were devised.” Gordon Rattray Taylor used the words “patrist” and “matrist” to describe these attitudes. He noted that the outlook of the dominant social group seems to swing between the two extremes. However, the patrist assertion that the patriarchal system of authority was the original and universal system of social organization leads to the establishment of corresponding institutions (Taylor, Gordon Rattray. Theories of Matriarchy and Patriarchy. Sex in History ).

    History of Western Patriarchy

    Aristotle

    Patriarchy
    Antique illustration of Aristotle Credit: ilbusca

    In the third century BC, Aristotle taught that the city-state developed out of the patriarchal family. However, he thought the family and the state were different in kind as well as in scale.[mfn]Lock, John, “Two Treatises of Government, with a supplement Patriarcha by Robert Filmer, edited with an introduction by Thomas I. Cook, New York. Hafner Press, 1947[/mfn] He wrote that the highest form of human community is the political community.

    The Politics

    In The Politics, Aristotle attempts to illustrate the nature of the hierarchies that exist in the political community and its subordinate communities. He then argues for an origin of male rule. In Chapter Thirteen he states that men and women have different kinds of virtue, “just as those who are natural subjects differ (from those who rule by nature.)” Other types of community, such as the household, are subordinate and inferior to the polis.

    Aristotle proposed that the household is subordinate to the political community because the aim of life in the household is the mere preservation of life, or the satisfaction of life’s daily needs, whereas the aim of membership in the political community is to live well. He also proposed that the household is inferior to the political community in the character of its rule. In the household, the man rules by virtue of his age and sex, monarchically at best and tyrannically at worst. In the polis, citizens choose their rulers on the basis of merit. (Stauffer, Dana Jalbert Aristotle’s Account of the Subjection of Women

    Socrates

    Patriarchy
    Illustration of a bust of the Greek philosopher Socrates after Visconti. credit: Gwengoat

    Both Plato and Aristotle seem to have followed the lead of Socrates. Socrates denied that citizens had the basic virtue necessary to nurture a good society. He equated virtue with knowledge unattainable by ordinary people. During Athens’ struggle with undemocratic Sparta, Socrates favored Sparta (Linder, Doug, The Trial of Socrates).

    Plato

    Patriarchy
    Plato (Greek philosopher, 428/427 BC – 348/347 BC). Lithograph after an antique bust by Joseph Brodtmann (German-swiss engraver and publisher, 1787-1862), published c. 1830. Credit: ZU_09

    Plato never mentioned Socrates’ sedition against Athens. However, the cosmology of the Timaeus includes the idea that a man who lives well will live a happy and congenial life on his consort star. Failing this a man’s second birth will be as a woman. (41E-42D, on the Creation of Souls).

    The Athenians and the Egyptians Compared

    Other ancient societies contemporary with Aristotle, as well as many Athenians, did not share these views of women, family organization, or political and economic structure.[mfn]del Giorgio, J.F. The Oldest Europeans. Guadeamus, Caracas, Venezuela, 2003[/mfn] Egypt left no philosophical record. Herodotus, on the other hand, left a record of his shock at the contrast between the roles of Egyptian women and the women of Athens. He observed that Egyptian women attended market and were employed in trade. In ancient Egypt a middle-class woman might sit on a local tribunal, engage in real estate transactions, and inherit or bequeath property. Women also secured loans, and witnessed legal documents.

    This changed, however. Greek influence spread with the conquests of Alexander the Great, who was educated by Aristotle.[mfn]Bristow, John Temple. “What Paul Really said about Women: an Apostle’s liberating views on equality in marriage, leadership, and love”, Harper Collins, New York, 1991[/mfn] Eventually, when Alexander wanted to unite his two empires in equality, Aristotle was adamant that all non-Greeks should be enslaved.

    Aristotle and the Jews

    About 200 BC the Jewish Philosopher Aristobulus of Panaeas claimed that Jewish revelation and Aristotelian philosophy were identical. Within 200 years, it was assumed that Aristotle derived his doctrine directly from Judaism. In the 12th century the Talmudist philosopher and astronomer, Maimonides harmonized Aristotlianism with Judaism. Subsequent rabbinical thought includes such pronouncements as “Eve was not created simultaneously with Adam because God foreknew that later she would be a source of complaint (Gen. R. xvii). “Nine curses together with death befell Eve in consequence of her disobedience” (Pirke R. E. Xiv.; Ab. R.N. ii. 42). While Maimonides dared to contradict Aristotle’s ideas in matters of faith, it wasn’t long before the Islamic Philosopher Averroes, endorsed them without reserve. Aristotle in Jewish Legend

    Adam and Eve: Patriarchy in Christianity

    For the last 1800 years Christian leaders have placed great emphasis on the creation of Eve, believing that the story was historical fact, rather than androcentric myth. This has been used as evidence of insurmountable character defects, not just for Eve but for all women. In the 2nd century Tertullian, the son of a centurion and a pagan until middle life, told women believers, “Do you not know that you are Eve?…Because of the death which you brought upon us, even the Son of God had to die” (De cultu feminarum, libri duo I, 1).

    In the 4th Century, the basic attitude was one of puzzlement over the fact of woman’s existence. Augustine of Hippo said he could not see how a woman could be any help for a man if the work of childbearing is excluded. However, it was only with Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century that Aristotle’s teachings emerged in the official teachings of Roman Catholicism. In the Summa Theologica, Aristotle asserted that women are misbegotten males (I 92 I ad 1). The influence of combining Aristotle’s theory with Biblical interpretations can’t be overestimated.

    Christine de Pizan on the Christian Canon

    In about 1404 Christine de Pizan wrote “Le livre de la cite des dames”. This was a systematic feminist treatise arguing against the misogyny in classical works and the Christian Canon. After the advent of printing, the discourse became known as “the Querelle des femmes” and continued for the next 400 years.

    Sir Robert Filmer and the Divine Right of Kings

    From the time of Martin Luther, Protestantism regularly used the commandment in Exodus 20:12 to justify the duties owed to all superiors. ‘Honor thy father,’ became a euphemism for the duty to obey the king. But Aristotle’s appeal took on political meaning primarily as a secular doctrine. Although many 16th and 17th century theorists agreed with Aristotle’s views concerning the place of women in society, none of them tried to prove political obligation on the basis of the patriarchal family until sometime after 1680. Sir Robert Filmer is primarily responsible for the patriarchal political theory. Sometime before 1653, Filmer completed a work entitled Patriarcha. In it he defended the divine right of kings as having title inherited from Adam, the first man of the human race. He based this theory on the Judeo-Christian tradition.

    John Locke on Filmer

    In 1688 John Locke called Filmer’s all-powerful prince “…this strange kind of domineering phantom called the ‘fatherhood’ which, whoever could catch, presently got empire and unlimited, absolute power.” Locke asserted that if ‘honor thy father’, places everyone in subjection to political authority, then it couldn’t mean the duty owed to natural fathers, since they are subjects. By Filmer’s doctrine fathers have no power since power belongs solely to the prince. Locke also observed that those who propose political rights based on this commandment invariably omit the word ‘mother’ which is present in the Biblical verse. (His editor, however, made a note of Locke’s inconsistency in attributing natural law to the governance of relations between a father and his children, while stating that the law governing relations between a man and his wife is based on legality, or on Eve’s punishment after the Fall. Two Treatises of Government).

    Aristotle’s view was not weakened by this argument. It had been elevated to an anthropological doctrine.

    Nineteenth Century Feminism

    In the 19th Century, Sarah Grimké dared to question the divine origin of the scriptures. Later, Elizabeth Caddy Stanton used Grimke’s criticism of Biblical sources to establish a basis for feminist thought. She published The Woman’s Bible, which proposed a feminist reading of the Old and New Testament. Subsequently, feminist theory denounced the patriarchal Judeo-Christian tradition. [mfn]Castro, Ginette. American Feminism: a contemporary history. New York University Press. 1990[/mfn]

    Patriarchy
    “Elizabeth Cady Stanton (November 12, 1815 – October 26, 1902) was an American social activist, abolitionist, and leading figure of the early woman’s movement. Illustration was published in 1882″Credit: denisk0

    Theosophy, Evolution and Racism: Patriarchy at its Worst

    In Europe, from about 1770, the rationalist Enlightenment and the desire for mystery had brought about a resurgence of a synthesis of Gnosticism, neoplatonism and kabbalistic theosophy. This particular version arose first in the utilitarian and industrial countries of America and England with the theosophy of Madame Helena Blavatsky. This had a profound impact in Germany where it fit into the lebenzreform movement. Blavatsky probably influenced Adolf Hitler through the writings of Guido von List and Lanz von Liebenfels.

    Guido von List

    List sought a chauvinistic mystique for the defense of Germandom against the liberal, socialist and Jewish political forces in the late Wilhelmine Era. His blueprint involved ruthless subjection of non-Aryans in a hierarchical state; qualification of candidates for education or positions in public service, as well as in professions and commerce, based on racial purity. All non-Aryans were to be slaves. His political principles included racial and marital laws, and a patriarchal society where only male heads had full majority and where only Ario-Germans had freedom and citizenship. Each family was to have a genealogical record, proving Aryan lineage. he proposed a new feudalism where only the first-born inherits. These ideas were published as early as 1911. They were similar to the Nuremberg Laws of 1935.

    Lanz von Liebenfels

    Darwinist writers, who wrote of blond, blue-eyed Aryans, were influential in the writings of von Liebenfels. Von Liebenfels had illiberal, pan-German and monarchical sentiments. He believed the lower classes were inferior races. It followed that they must be exterminated along with the weak. Socialism, democracy and feminism were his most important targets. Women were a special problem in his view because they were more prone to bestial lust. He advocated brood mothers in eugenic convents, sterilization and other practices that later influenced the Third Reich, apparent in Himmler’s anticipation of polygamy for his Schutzstaffel (SS), care of unmarried mothers in SS homes, and musings on the education and marriage of chosen women.[mfn]Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan cults and their influence on Nazi ideology: the Ariosophists of Austria and Germany, 1890-1935, New York University Press. 1992[/mfn]

    Romantics and Marxists

    By 1673, Francois Poullain de la Barre, “On the Equality of the Two Sexes”, had turned feminism into a systematic Enlightenment philosophy (as opposed to the previous Renaissance feminism). However, in 1861, Johann Jakob Bachofen, a German romantic and writer of the counter-Enlightenment said that matriarchy preceded patriarchy, and is superior to patriarchy on moral grounds. Bachofen influenced Karl Marx and Frederick Engles. Marxist analysis has been a basis for subsequent feminist thought.[mfn]Stjepan Gabriel Meštrović, Durkheim and postmodern culture. A. de Gruyter, New York. 1992[/mfn]  From the beginning, socialist feminists in France, for example, were challenged by the republic, which “oppressed them as workers and women; by Marxism, which ignores gender; and by the misogyny of their socialist brothers. This struggle continues within all parties of the left (History of Feminism).

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