I am going to begin this essay with some nerd lore.
In JRR Tolkien’s Middle Earth, elves are an immortal race of staggering beauty, deep wisdom, rich culture and advanced magical propensity. The elves often find themselves at odds with the orcs, a hideous race who live for violence and destruction. In Tolkien’s The Silmarillion, it is revealed that orcs were actually the creation of an evil lord named Melkor, later known as Morgoth, who captured a group of elves and imprisoned them. The elves “by slow arts of cruelty were corrupted and enslaved; and thus did Melkor breed the hideous race of the Orcs in envy and mockery of the Elves, of whom they were afterwards the bitterest foes.”
I always think of this when I see trends in our society which began as healthy and good impulses, but which over time became twisted and warped by egotism and manipulation. Something springs up in human consciousness out of inspiration and natural compassion, quickly gains public support because truth is attractive, and then is eventually hijacked and perverted as power finds a way to twist that energy in a way it can use and exploit. It becomes “orc-ified”.
You can see examples of this orcification spring up everywhere in real time. You can watch it in yourself as your own ego tries to hijack your own healthy impulses to aggrandize and masturbate itself, and you can watch them in society at large as well. A recent and extremely blatant example would be when the enthusiastic grassroots populism of the Bernie Sanders campaign was twisted by the Democratic establishment into the #Resistance movement after the 2016 election. Now many of the progressives who I once saw sincerely pushing away from oligarchy and endless war can be seen smearing Julian Assange and cheerleading for new cold war escalations with their support for the CIA/CNN Russia narrative.
Other examples abound. America’s brilliant civil rights activism has been largely co-opted by the good cop/bad cop game of partisan dynamics which now sees Black Americans supporting a party that does absolutely nothing to protect them from police brutality, economic hardship, a depraved legal system etc, for no other reason than that the Republicans are even crueler to them than the Democrats are. On the other side of the aisle, healthy impulses to minimize government intrusiveness and corruption have been used by manipulators like the Koch brothers under the banner of “libertarianism” to strip corporations of their regulations without ever diminishing government size or corporatist influence upon it, effectively leaving only end-stage neoliberalism and hemorrhage-upward economics. The healthy impulse toward truth is orcified to manufacture support for internet censorship under the pretense of protecting the public from “fake news” and “Russian propaganda”, the healthy impulse to protect and defend is orcified into support for “humanitarian” war, and the healthy impulse to become a better person is orcified into religions and philosophies which have been popularized by the powerful in the service of the powerful.
Anywhere you see a healthy impulse arising in society, you will see attempts to twist it into the service of power, and this is very much the case with feminism.
When I talk about being a feminist, I get a mix of three reactions:
- People who either understand what I mean by that word or put the necessary amount of effort into understanding.
- People who assume I am saying that I hate men, which is just a silly projection that people who hate women have made up in their imaginations.
- People who assume I mean the warped, orcified version of feminism that they see promulgated in mainstream culture to manipulate women into supporting a system that was designed by men and for men.
I love when guys are all "I just don't get it! How can someone so insightful support FEMINISM??" You answered your own question, bucko; I am feminist because I am insightful. Just because Dems hijacked the mainstream trends doesn't mean there's no deeper underlying wisdom there.
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) January 5, 2018
And it is a simple fact that the near entirety of human civilization has been designed by men. All around the world for thousands of years, wherever a civilization sprang up, the larger, stronger gender was naturally in a position to assert dominance over the way that civilization was run. Leadership systems were invented by men, social hierarchies were invented by men, marriage was invented by men, family structural norms were designed by men, money was invented by men, war was invented by men, and men invented religions which just so happened to have patriarchal gods who all agreed that the way men had set things up was indeed right and just.
Women were essentially property throughout most of this, and thus had very little input into how any of it was set up. Generation after generation after generation of women were born into this male-engineered society, over thousands and thousands of years, into a system so deeply and extensively normalized that it’s almost impossible to imagine what our society might look like had it not been dominated entirely by men throughout its history.
And then, very, very recently in the grand scheme of things, a healthy impulse emerged among women to cease being second-class citizens, and to instead stand as equals with their brothers.
In response, after much whining and foot-dragging, the men who ran things said in effect, “Right. Okay. You want equality? Fine. The jobs we invented are over there, the capitol building for the government we invented is over there, the bank for the economic system we invented is across the street, the Department of War is two blocks that way, and the Church of the Patriarchal God is around the corner. Welcome to equality!”
And some rich guys standing by watching leaned in and whispered to each other, “Sweet, double the workforce! We can halve their wages!”
New addition to the #McResistance: the women of jihadist-occupied Idlib. They might as well photograph them in pink pussy hijabs for fuck's sake. Simon Tisdall is by far the most disgusting war propagandist at The Guardian, and that's saying something.https://t.co/xyKlB4tZNd
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) May 27, 2018
And that natural, healthy impulse toward true equality became quickly orcified. “Equality” now looks like women working full time to keep their heads above water in an economic system designed by men while still being expected to raise healthy children, and “feminism” looks like fighting men for a few more scraps from the oligarchic table while voting to elect women to the male-designed government. It is an energetic funnel into a system which was not built with any interest in women’s strengths (and yes, like men we do have our own strengths) or women’s struggles. This is what feminists are pointing to when they use the word patriarchy.
True feminism is about picking apart that entire system. Fake feminism is about bolstering and feeding into it.
True feminism values motherhood and caregiving roles, not just with empty “Gosh, yeah, hardest job in the world” words and a pat on the back now and then, but with the same valuing system which rewards industriousness and other masculine accomplishments; in the current system that would mean receiving an equal amount of money for that work instead of having to rely on the hopefully charitable inclinations of a husband. Fake feminism encourages women to take on jobs that are valued by the patriarchal mindset and perform the full-time task of mothering in their spare time. For free, because the herculean job of motherhood “is its own reward” (*cough* bullshit *cough cough*).
True feminism questions the very nature of the governmental systems which were designed hundreds of years ago by men who owned wives as functional property, and takes seriously the goal of removing all toxic dynamics from within them. Fake feminism endorses those governmental systems and teaches that the most feminist thing anyone can do is elect women like Hillary Clinton who have clawed their way to the top by their facilitation of war, crony capitalism and rape culture.
It would be really really awesome if someday abuse of women was moved into the spotlight for the pervasive, soul-destroying evil that it intrinsically is, instead of something people only care about when someone of a different political faction perpetrates it.
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) November 15, 2018
True feminism aggressively attacks the cultural mind viruses which say that no sometimes means yes, that a wife must perform sexually for her husband, that it’s okay to manipulate or guilt a woman into sex, that anyone else should have any say in what a woman does with her own reproductive system, that women ought to be subservient and humble, that it’s okay to harm a woman if she steps out of line. Fake feminism only touches on those things when it is politically advantageous and can be used as a weapon to attack rival ideological factions.
True feminism works to untangle all the toxic, pernicious knots in social consciousness one by one, leaving no norm unquestioned and no default assumption untested, since the reality of patriarchy is interwoven throughout every single aspect of society without exception. Fake feminism leaves all the male-programmed default settings in place, then adds on a few cosmetic accessories like equal pay for equal patriarchal work.
True feminism is as deeply revolutionary as anything can be, since its realization necessarily means a complete revision of society from the ground up in order to allow the feminine influence to be truly heard in our culture. Fake feminism gives you a pussy hat, a twenty-three cent raise, and an “I Voted” sticker.
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44 responses to “True Feminism”
I’ve often thought it odd that “Feminism” appeared exactly at the moment the revolutionary movement of ’68 and the hippy movement created a possible turning point in our (his)tory, and split that impulse into gendered factions.
For example, I read somewhere that Gloria Steinem worked for the CIA. Perhaps someone could join the dots about its orcification by the patriarchy.
Feminism didn’t “appear” in 1968.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-wave_feminism
This is great. I’m going to stop calling people trolls, and call them orcs instead.
The usual commie rant.
There is no good feminism. There is no true feminism.
Feminism is Marxism. Johnstone is a Marxist.
So, we get the usual litany of tiresome Marxist lies represented as something new.
All feminism is Marxist lies. Johnstone is the usual commie liar, inventing a bullshit grievance.
I’m not any kind of feminist. Fuck your feminism.
This is a really great post, Caitlin! It is I think the first time I have read one from you on various sites that specifically addresses the subject of feminism as its main or only focus. While I thought some of these ideas were implicit in a lot of your other work, this really makes it clear. Labels can be inadequate and confusing, but it seems more in the tradition of second wave feminism. Some points in here remind me of misgivings and that your compatriot Germaine Greer stated 30 years ago about “equality feminism” and warnings she gave about going down that road. I mean it as the sincerest compliment to say that you are building on that work and adding a lot of insight of your own.
For many years, starting in the 1980s during Reaganism, and even more so in the 1990s and forward, I was increasingly baffled by what feminism had become and where it was going. I eventually heard the term “third wave” to describe it, but that didn’t help me understand. Mostly I just kind of went along with it, figuring, “well, it’s not for some old, white, gay guy to criticize feminism or say what it is or isn’t.”
One way or another, I’ve found my way to some radical feminist sites. It’s been quite recently, in the last 3-5 years. I found your writing much more recently, and all of it is sharp and on point, and quite often brutally hilarious.
I do have one critical comment about one small thing in this essay that caught my eye. It is in this part:
” … wherever a civilization sprang up, the larger, stronger gender was naturally in a position to assert dominance over the way that civilization was run.”
Here is one case where I would say that instead of the word “gender,” the word “sex” might be more appropriate. Some might think that this is a trivial linguistic quibble, but a lot of misunderstanding has resulted from the confusion of sex and gender. I believe that the confusion has contributed to serious conflicts between people and poorly considered policies.
BTW, I hope that you have all your content archived very securely and are using an ISP that has solid intellectual freedom policies, etc. You may have heard already, but several websites, some run by radical feminists, have been suspended recently, ones that are critical of transgender theory and ideology. Not abusive or violence inciting, just critical. GenderTrender is perhaps the best known, but there are others. Not sure exactly where you stand in that debate, and of course you are not obligated to say one way or the other, but I did think you might be interested, as an IF issue.
Super work, all of it; keep it up!
Thank You…for pointing out that important distinction! Feminist Current is a wonderful site that I follow for radical/2nd wave feminist analysis and news.
I, too, am baffled by liberal “choice” feminism of today. But I hope it is just a passing trend because “true feminism” is rooted deep–the backbone of feminist analysis. I’m thankful for all those women who share the courage to remember and preserve the radical roots of feminism. People are trying so hard to chip away at it.
And it’s also baffling to see some men’s comments on here revealing so clearly how propagandized they have become. Their defensiveness is such a clear indication of this, especially since, like, what are they afraid of really? Men keep perpetuating the narrative that feminism is some juvenile battle of the sexes when it couldn’t be further from this. It’s maddening how hard they must be trying to maintain their self created echo chamber of ignorance. It makes me think there is some kind of constant battle going on within men to become so easily threatened. No matriarchies have EVER dominated, brutalized, or violated men—ever.
I really appreciate your support of Julian Assange. His situation and abandonment by his own country, the UK and the Guardian is immensely troubling. As for those mad neocons male and female they may destroy our planet before we have sorted the battle of the sexes.
Please it’s not MEN. Maybe the few with authority can be finger pointed. The vast majority of men have been culturally conditioned slaves. I don’t think most of the women socialising with those men with authority have been too concerned about their sisters down below them on the ladder.
Young women in the West are now more qualified and earning more than young men who are failing to find their way. Please read Warren Farrels the Boy Crisis for the appalling stats ‘re boys and men. The idea that most men are free and powerful is a joke.
The idea that men are violent and women aren’t just isn’t supported by the evidence. Yes the most violent are men. Women are violent too just on average less damaging.
Women in the West have or are in the middle of removing some of their cultural shackles and men haven’t even started. We all have a long way to go. We need to work together. Listen to some Jordan Petersen.
It’s not MEN. It’s the cultural conditioning and history that we all arise from. Who takes and drags those poor girls to those men to have their clitorises brutally removed. Both sexes are entrapped in the cultural games
Most of the men I know delight in seeing women succeed. I certainly do.
Those men at the top who dominate the rest of us with their female side kicks and bosses – they aren’t free either. They are driven and compelled too.
We need to get together us males and females. If we don’t I see nothing but hell coming our way.
We need those who resist change, the conservatives and those that are going for change. We need the debate. We need the femine and we need the masculine energy.
Right on, sister!
You are an idiot.
@Lee
Who is your comment directed at?
Caitlin, you have absolutely hit the nail on the head here. It’s something that I’ve been saying for years — money and power aren’t directed to those who provide the greatest benefits to society, money and power are directed to those who already hold the purse strings (and the power that goes with it). It’s the same problem with the label, “unskilled labor.” There is no such thing as unskilled labor. Instead, there is labor that is far removed from the control of money, resources, and power — those are the ones who are paid the least. Social, cultural, religious, and legal structures enforce a narrative that only certain types of work or people are worthy of appropriate compensation or social status. The powerless groups usually include women (the largest group with the longest history of oppression), certain racial/ethnic groups (various groups who’ve been enslaved or subjugated throughout history), and those who are otherwise not part of the dominant culture (historically poor, less-connected groups of people who might be involved with certain trades, etc.).
The people who are paid the most are those who have the greatest access to, and control over money and power…it has nothing to do with their value to society. They design our economic, political, and social structures specifically to funnel money to those at the top, and then try to convince people that the reason for the wealth/income disparity is because they are somehow more valuable to society. Oftentimes, they are simply middlemen who create laws that force people to use their networks (can be distribution networks, or designated groups who provide the only legal means of access) in order to obtain the desired/necessary goods or services.
Back to the issue of REAL feminism, where “women’s work” is accorded the economic and social status that it deserves when one considers its importance to society…what many of the people who are responding defensively don’t seem to grasp is that this is not an attack on men or “men’s work.” It simply means that we need to rethink our socio-politial structures so that they reward those who perform the most important jobs in society. If you think that those “great men who created civilization” are important, what of the women who were responsible for their existence in the first place? What about the women who raised their children and took care of their “non-work” duties so that these great men could dedicate the time and energy to creating and building things? If not for those women, these men 1.) would not exist, and 2.) would not be able to commit to creating and building because they would be busy caring for thier children and ailing family members. The male-female a totally symbiotic relationship, and the money and power derived from the many important contributions of both sexes should reflect that.
Wish we had an edit button! Correction to one of the multiple typos: “The male-female a totally symbiotic relationship…” was supposed to be written as, “The male-female relationship is a totally symbiotic relationship…”
Very true indeed !!!
On a different topic that I can’t help myself but post now: in the CounterPunch article by Paul Street “Barack von Obamenburg, Herr Donald, and Big Capitalist Hypocrisy: On How Fascism Happens” therein he wrote:
“In some cases I have encountered, previously serious-seeming leftists have practically embraced Trump and channeled Moscow-hatched Caitlin/Diana Johnstoneite “red-brown” and “geopolitical” talking points…”
I have been holding on to a little but fading hope that the CounterPunch that in the 1990’s was in an alliance against the bombing of Yugoslavia with the Paleoconservative Chronicles group led by Thomas Fleming will join again in alliance with antiwar conservatives. A couple of months ago CounterPunch stopped publishing articles by Diana Johnstone and Mike Whitney and then bent its knee to the Propornot conspiracy arguing that it didn’t deserve to be on the list (but implicitly that others did deserve it). During the 2016 election Paul Street was able to think outside the confines of Left and Right but has morphed to what we see today.
The quote above tells me that he is fully signed on to the major narratives as directed by US elites. It was the Propornot conspiracy of the Atlantic Council, CIA, NATO and Ukrainian intelligence that threw over CounterPunch.
Women bring to society all the good things, men bring all the bad things. Naive perspective when you consider that the vast majority of men were working hard trying to provide for their families so that women could be free to be mothers, have children, educate their children etc. Does the motive of the majority not count for anything?
Here is a similar argument to yours, using similar logic: all these bad men were created by women! If you need to blame someone, maybe you should start there? I am guessing I know your response: the bad men forced the good women to have babies!
None of this is constructive and most comes from your poor understanding of the majority of men, maybe you should correct that issue first.
I think we constantly face choices between becoming better persons in terms that we know, on the one hand, and yielding to temptations to take risks on the chance of gaining happiness or pleasure, on the other. Folly lies in giving in to temptations. As for feminism, I think women are currently more apt than men to make choices in favor of becoming better persons. But such an assessment arises in a culture that has been patriarchal for a long time. In older times, Joseph Campbell (the late Professor of Literature at Sarah Lawrence College) claims there were matriarchies, and in those cultures, if any, the tendency toward betterment might have been greater in males.
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Whatever it is that leads human beings to “freely” decide to have fewer children or, best of all, no children at all is a wonderful thing.
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Bravo, Caitlin and Tim!
Thank you! Not fully there yet but I see my work ahead, please keep on writing this narrative where we can all be better.
Feminism: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_Hyi5gpWOk&feature=youtu.be
I’m surprised that you didn’t mention the Kavanaugh hearings.
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Democrats pursued spurious accusations that:
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1) avoided real issues related to Kavanaugh’s support for authoritarianism
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2) would almost certainly undermine the #MeToo Movement.
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Kavanaugh’s bias for Presidential authority makes him unfit to be a Supreme Court Justice. Full stop. Disputes between the Legislative and Executive branches of US government are decided by the Supreme Court. A Justice that has a bias for one of these branches can not be impartial. In fact, the executive branch (President Trump) refused to provide most of Kavanaugh’s work product from the Bush years to the Senate Judicial Committee.
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The #MeToo Movement is arguably the most important Feminist development in 10 years or more. Cutting it down to size serves the establishment -AND- establishment women (i.e. the people that matter). In fact, many of the prominent men fingered by the #MeToo Movement have been Democrats. IMO the use of dubious accusations also undermined women’s voices in general by giving fodder to those what are critical of feminism and women who speak out. Many of the most important voices against oligarchy and imperialism are women.
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I wrote about this HERE (nearly 2 months ago, before the hearings concluded):
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2018/09/22/medea-benjamin-shows-america-what-real-resistance-looks-like/4061/
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And also at MoonofAlabama.org, a blog focused on international relations.
By your own words may you be judged. Reading the poetry you published earlier in the year, you are definitely the Orc type of feminist. The arrogance of quoting your own writings as as a way of giving credence to your statements obviously goes over your head.
The world we live in is the result of the organisation and inventions of men , because men ar definitively proven to be more creative and inventive than women, not necessarily because they are physically stronger. The idea that the world would be a better place if based on the inventions and organisation of women is ridiculous . One has only to work in an office ruled by a woman and populated totally by women to observe the silly petty competition and spite that is inevitable. Cop on girls you are no more perfect than men.
By your own words may you be judged. Reading the poetry you published earlier in the year, you are definitely the Orc type of feminist. The arrogance of quoting your own writings as as a way of giving credence to your statements obviously goes over your head. The world we live in is the result of the organisation and inventions of men , because men ar definitively proven to be more creative and inventive than women, not necessarily because they are physically stronger. The idea that the world would be a better place if based on the inventions and organisation of women is ridiculous . One has only to work in an office ruled by a woman and populated totally by women to observe the silly petty competition and spite that is inevitable. Cop on girls you are no more perfect than men.
I believe the women [Caitlin rocks!] who are writing and commenting here and can’t understand why you don’t. I cringe at the phrase, “check your privilege,” even as I type this, but…
So what’s the economic idea here, Caitlin? A statute that entitles every wife and mother to a certain percentage of the husband’s paycheck? Government to pony up when no husband is available? Watch all husbands run for the hills! Or should the state just pony up universally? Watch the civilization built by a once free people collapse into total degeneracy, an amplified version of the story we’re now living. Women busy selling real estate and typing some middle manager’s correspondence are not going to engineer a rebirth of civilization and community. (Kudos for pointing out the rarely-mentioned taxman’s interest in state-organized “equality”.) Acid-tongued grievances loudly expressed and coupled with demands the State revise laws and custom accordingly aren’t going to solve today’s rot.
Technology has done more to liberate women than “feminism” ever managed. The assault on men today is appalling, not helpful, and historically speaking, quite stupid. An arrangement has to have something for all parties to it, if it is to endure. Sure marriage is expected to solve the male’s (and femaile’s) problem of sexual access, but the real draw long-term is that of lifetime partnership.
I have the same question Tatiana Tolstaya, grand niece of the novelist and an author herself, did after an onslaught by late 1980s feminists on the East Coast who assumed that as a Soviet she would naturally share their ideas, opinions, and dogma:
What possible good can a defeated man be to me or any woman?
Misdirected feminism needs to ponder that question.
That said, I can’t say how much I enjoy reading your essays, Caitlin. You’re the tops!
Your comment made me think. When you examine the issue closely, however, it’s clear that the socialization of women (and men) forever distorts their behaviour. When you’re immersed in a culture that rewards a behaviour, you get more of that behaviour.
So, when we see women behaving in toxic ways with each other and with men, we’re not seeing their natural behaviour. Just as we’re not seeing men’s natural behaviour.
What feminism WAS striving to do, but lately has lost this focus, was to reveal these toxic behaviours and social structures which imposes FAR greater costs on women and girls physically, economically and emotionally than on men.
This is what Caitlin consistently expresses in her writing. Nobody wins.
In any organization or idea that starts as a good thing that is doing well, sociopaths will be attracted if there is a possibility of making money out of it, and they always rise to the top because they have no problem with lying, cheating and stealing (and even killing) to get ahead, and ruin what started as a good thing. Some corporations actually test potential employees for sociopathy, and deliberately hire them. Corporations themselves, which the Supreme Court declared are persons, are sociopaths, so human sociopaths fit in well, and advance in capitalist patriarchal society.
Real Feminism, as described by you Caitlin could be a bigger revolution after the Industrial revolution, rather a greater Renneisense than the one which Europe witnessed 500 years ago .
I presume that the corporatocracy has an idea that the real feminist revolution will undo them as a spider undoes the fly. That’s why they prop up, create fake feminism and stage up those showpieces who claim to be feminist-role-models doing a man’s work, at a man’s workplace.
Totally agree with everything you said. I could have written it, but you did it better. I was a feminist in the early 1970s when it meant something. It gave me the confidence to go to medical school. We had consciousness raising groups for women medical students. Early societies like hunter gatherers were matrilineal and worshiped the Great Cosmic Mother. I was greatly influenced by Elaine Morgan’s “The Descent of Woman”, and Riane Eisler’s “The Chalice and the Blade”. After getting my MD, I rejected patriarchal allopathic medicine and practiced orthomolecular (nutritional) psychiatry and homeopathy. Thanks for a great job, as usual.
Amen!! Very clearly stated Caitlin. Thank you.
A fully feminist man here (true feminist, that is). It is NOT about men vs. women. It is about the awakening vs. the asleep, the heartfelt vs. the heartless, the selfless vs. the selfish.
Awakening men will rise up and stand beside women, in opposition to those men who imprison all of us. The kind of men who sexually assault women; the kind of men who manipulate economic systems solely for their own benefit; the kind of men who confuse aggression with assertiveness, will be met by a gender-inclusive force of benevolent souls, who will no longer tolerate the stripping of our human dignity, the raping of this planet or of women.
I appreciate the good intentions of those who believe that we are ready to move away from opposition as a construct altogether, but it seems they might be putting the heart before the force. It seems premature in a society that is still highly unconscious and programmed by those who don’t have our best interests at heart. We unfortunately still need to fight for our right to the light, and we need to do it together. Not as two polarized genders, but as souldiers of a higher order united by care and love, ready to lead humanity into the heart, into compassion.
It strikes me as ironic that you cite this very English misogynistic closet queen JRR Tolkien. Don’t get me wrong, I love the man’s work, but his implicitly queer couples – Sam & Frodo, Gandalf & Saruman, Merry & Pippin – sparkle while the very few female characters remain cardboard cut-outs.
Good job building a feminist argument out of that!
This is yet another of your writings that makes me shout – I love her!!! I could have written more of less this exact same thing – but I didn’t, and you did. Thank you
I was a feminist in the 1980’s then drifted off into some rural dream. Now I am back, naming the patriarchy when I feel it’s useful to wake people up. And I think young women are are strong as ever and even stronger with social media now at their fingertips. They are onto it. We can talk about the patriarchy now without feeling like something that has crawled out of the bushes. Perhaps at last we can begin to imagine the world – after patriarchy?
Could it be that feminism is a key part of the train wreck of modern Western society where one in five children is autistic, belligerent, selfish and hooked on social media? Wind back three generations and find children were healthy, respectful and successful, brought up mainly by their mothers.
I thought the refrigerator Mother theory was disproved years ago. Besides, I’m pretty sure Temple Gandin had a stay-at-home Mom.
*Grandin*
YES – YES – YES – ‼️❣
Do You know the “Story” about the old Egyptian Pharao NARMER? He invented and named it PATRIARCHY under the protection of the goddess ISIS. The two established the god NIM, the god of fertility. That’s history – the way PATRIARCHY started – about 5.000 years ago. Imagine!
You’ll find a picture, a drawing of men’s king (old Egyptian) in Wikipedia.
About every other work of yours I read gives me the feeling that I’ve gained a new and valuable way of looking at things I’ve looked at a thousand times before, and this is one of them. I hope they don’t shoot you and if they try, I hope they miss. Stay fearless.
Agree. A few comments : There is a theory/ belief that the original family unit was a mother supported by her brothers and other extended family members. The fathers of her children were from other families/ clans and were junior members until if they had what it took they worked their way up the pecking order over time. Children were socialised by an extended family, the core of which was the woman’s family. There is a belief that this structure collapsed with the invention of agriculture, but something like it survives today, or in the recent past in some societies. The present ‘western’ unitary (or sub-unitary as many children are raised by the mother alone is simply under resourced for the demands placed on the lone couple, now that both man and wife usually need to work outside the home to make ends meet. This is a structural problem, and cannot be made to work well. Until we look at these issues as system problems and blame the individual actors for the failure of a defective system then there will be no improvement.
Thanks Caitlin. Keep up the great work!
Sorry, you still have it wrong. The orvcified version of feminism is the one that believes the nonsense you repeat here: that women were property and that men engineered society this way for their own benefit.
Men and women have been complementary and collaborative throughout history. Gender roles, whatever their utility today, were necessities of nature, “enforced” equally by men and women alike (and even more by Natural Selection). They were not imposed by men, at women’s expense.
I’m sorry; you’re utterly wrong and this narrative is harmful to men and women alike.
I say this as one of your most faithful and dedicated supporters. Your anti-war commentary is arguably the most important of our generation. Your feminism is orcified.
Bullshit.
Women were legally viewed as property. How can property consent to anything. To consent implies an ability to have free will…..
Absolutely agree, Caitlin has a huge plank in her eye when it comes to this subject.
Absolutely agree, Caitlin has a huge plank in her eye when it comes to this subject. (Sorry, also posted this below by mistake)
Someone hasn’t done his homework.
The truth is somewhere in the middle.
I think we were more or less equal before “civilization”. Some civilizations were more civilized than others.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_rights