Excellent excerpt! It is bordering on silly to point to the sex of our legislators as proof of patriarchy. A much better question is who do our legislators serve? A good case can be made that our legislators are more likely to serve the needs of women than they are to serve the needs of men. Look at the history of laws protecting the safety of workers. Who did the early industrial revolution's laws protect? Not men, women and children! Who do our present laws protect? Look at the VAWA that protects women from domestic abuse while ignoring men who are also victims. Research shows that about half of the victims of domestic violence are men and yet they get very little from government or from the media. We have seven federal offices for women's health and zero for men. The list goes on and on. We are living in a gynocentric culture and very few are aware of this. Most simply nod in agreement with the feminist fantasies of patriarchy which defy even the simplest observations. Why do people nod in agreement? Gynocentrism.
I really appreciate Helens work. She makes me think that actually I'm more liberal than I've ever thought when I connect with what she explains.
I particularly liked her liberal conservative post which id never considered before.
One of the main takeaways from what's described in this essay and your writings as well as others is that men and women don't think differently just on average, make different choices which explains group differences which I think is very helpful way of understanding these points!
In viewing subsets rather than society as a whole, I tend to view patriarchy as a good thing, if its foundation is service, provision, and protection. What got the old patriarchy in trouble was its dissolution into foundations of power. That’s when everything went haywire.
I’ve seen both sides of this. When the patriarchy is a system based on others-centered traits, it is a very high functioning entity.
Everyone should read the full essay, which is excellent. We're in an odd place right now culturally. Patriarchy was decisively abolished in the 70s as part of a larger cultural revolution that was not announced; the revolution really was not televised, just as we were told in the 60s it would be. Because it was not announced, and since it is still within living memory, and because the most enthusiastic inheritors of the revolution were a different kind of sexist, the vocabulary has not updated. Otherwise astute people are still speaking of it as a current, living reality. The West needs to update its frame, because the current one is not adequate to explain the current world.
Yep, we need an updated frame; the world has changed a lot, but our beliefs about the world haven't kept pace. I agree that the essay is excellent, as is Helen herself!
I posted Helen Pluckrose’s article on Reddit and wrote a long post defending my case that the patriarchy does not exist in the US and UK. The post got removed from the subreddit but anyways, someone commented that, particularly in the US, the fact that the state still has control over women’s reproductive rights (abortion rights) is evidence that the patriarchy exists. Maybe not “patriarchy” but “structural misogyny”. In other words, misogyny is still somewhat prevalent in the state and that affects women negatively. What do you think about this argument? Does it disprove Helen Pluckrose’s claims?
I think it’s weak. The sexes don’t particularly differ in their views on abortion. As I wrote in this piece, the group most in favor of abortion rights = liberal women, whereas the group most opposed = conservative women. https://www.stevestewartwilliams.com/p/the-gender-war-that-wasnt So, it’s not really a matter of men controlling women.
Also, using the same logic, we could argue that, because the state forces men but not women to register for the draft, the U.S. is a matriarchy.
Excellent excerpt! It is bordering on silly to point to the sex of our legislators as proof of patriarchy. A much better question is who do our legislators serve? A good case can be made that our legislators are more likely to serve the needs of women than they are to serve the needs of men. Look at the history of laws protecting the safety of workers. Who did the early industrial revolution's laws protect? Not men, women and children! Who do our present laws protect? Look at the VAWA that protects women from domestic abuse while ignoring men who are also victims. Research shows that about half of the victims of domestic violence are men and yet they get very little from government or from the media. We have seven federal offices for women's health and zero for men. The list goes on and on. We are living in a gynocentric culture and very few are aware of this. Most simply nod in agreement with the feminist fantasies of patriarchy which defy even the simplest observations. Why do people nod in agreement? Gynocentrism.
I really appreciate Helens work. She makes me think that actually I'm more liberal than I've ever thought when I connect with what she explains.
I particularly liked her liberal conservative post which id never considered before.
One of the main takeaways from what's described in this essay and your writings as well as others is that men and women don't think differently just on average, make different choices which explains group differences which I think is very helpful way of understanding these points!
I’m not sure I’ve read the liberal conservative post - I don’t you have a link?
https://open.substack.com/pub/helenpluckrose/p/why-liberal-lefties-need-to-support-daf?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=350czr
Thanks!
Helen’s one of my favorites. An amazingly sharp thinker.
In viewing subsets rather than society as a whole, I tend to view patriarchy as a good thing, if its foundation is service, provision, and protection. What got the old patriarchy in trouble was its dissolution into foundations of power. That’s when everything went haywire.
I’ve seen both sides of this. When the patriarchy is a system based on others-centered traits, it is a very high functioning entity.
Everyone should read the full essay, which is excellent. We're in an odd place right now culturally. Patriarchy was decisively abolished in the 70s as part of a larger cultural revolution that was not announced; the revolution really was not televised, just as we were told in the 60s it would be. Because it was not announced, and since it is still within living memory, and because the most enthusiastic inheritors of the revolution were a different kind of sexist, the vocabulary has not updated. Otherwise astute people are still speaking of it as a current, living reality. The West needs to update its frame, because the current one is not adequate to explain the current world.
Yep, we need an updated frame; the world has changed a lot, but our beliefs about the world haven't kept pace. I agree that the essay is excellent, as is Helen herself!
I posted Helen Pluckrose’s article on Reddit and wrote a long post defending my case that the patriarchy does not exist in the US and UK. The post got removed from the subreddit but anyways, someone commented that, particularly in the US, the fact that the state still has control over women’s reproductive rights (abortion rights) is evidence that the patriarchy exists. Maybe not “patriarchy” but “structural misogyny”. In other words, misogyny is still somewhat prevalent in the state and that affects women negatively. What do you think about this argument? Does it disprove Helen Pluckrose’s claims?
I think it’s weak. The sexes don’t particularly differ in their views on abortion. As I wrote in this piece, the group most in favor of abortion rights = liberal women, whereas the group most opposed = conservative women. https://www.stevestewartwilliams.com/p/the-gender-war-that-wasnt So, it’s not really a matter of men controlling women.
Also, using the same logic, we could argue that, because the state forces men but not women to register for the draft, the U.S. is a matriarchy.
Oh okay, thank you!!