Suppose we switched from Patriarchy to Matriarchy?

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It's interesting that you should bring that up.

And if you'll indulge my special interest for a moment......

If we look to our closest cousins, the chimpanzees, we find that "social cooperation" is a distinctly MALE trait. Both humans and chimpanzees are unique in the animal kingdom in that, in most other species, males have very little friendly contact, especially with unrelated males. The whole of chimpanzee social structure is essentially based around the male/male bond and their ability to form mutually beneficial alliances in order to achieve political ends. A single male chimpanzee isn't strong enough to hold the position of alpha male" through brute strength alone. The climb to "alpha male" involves social schmoozing, garnering favor with males and females in the troop, and, of course, alliances with other males. The majority of mating opportunities typically go to the most "socially savvy" male who knows how to play the system.

In contrast, female chimps spend the majority of their time alone and have little to do with one another.

Some researchers are of the opinion that "male cooperation" is actually one of the pillars on which human civilization is founded, hence, one of the reason men have traditionally controlled both economic and political power in most societies, and why the majority of business owners and politicians will probably always be men. Part of the explanation for "patriarchy" isn't that men are blood-thirsty, violent, power-mongers, it's that women just happen to utterly suck at working together towards mutual goals.

Speaking from personal experience, I've always found groups of men to be much more efficient and cooperative than groups of women. If I was male, I'd find the attempt to frame "social cooperation" as a "feminine" trait to be sexist and offensive.



That's a very astute observation.

Men are only "more violent" if we only take physical aggression into account.

Besides, here's a fun fact: zookeepers have observed that, in captive chimpanzees, while males got into more physical fights, they rarely caused serious injuries to one another. Female chimps didn't engage in physical fights nearly as often, but, when they did, they were much more violent and veterinarians have to be called to treat the resulting potentially life-threatening injuries.

Furthermore, in our other cousins, the bonobo, we see a primarily matriarchal society; however, it's not "non-violent," as it's often billed, just typically less physically violent than chimpanzee society. Bonobo society hardly occupies the "moral high ground," matriarchy or not. Bonobo mothers employ all sorts of political machinations to advance their son's careers, and manipulate their own positions in the dominance hierarchy. Females chase males away from food sources, and physically take food from males if they feel so inclined. Groups of females have also been observed beating males into a bloody pulp to include biting off their fingers.

My point: a "matriarchy" could accommodate good, old-fashioned cut-throat capitalism quite well (and that's not a compliment towards matriarchies).



An excellent example of why painting an entire sex with certain negative attributes is socially toxic.

In this case, that all women are always potential victims, and men are all potential violent offenders.

dude, it's the internet. You want better citations for biological definitions? Fine:
Ecology, 4th Edition; Charles J. Krebs
glossary definition, dominance: condition in communities or in vegetational strata in which one or more species, by means of their number, coverage, or size, have considerable influence upon or control of the conditions of existence of associated species.
No glossary or index entry for 'superior' or 'superiority.'
Vertebrate Live, 4th edition; F. Harvey Pough, John B. Heiser, and William N. McFarland.
no glossary entries for dominance or superiority; index entry for 'dominance heirarchy' leads to a discussion on matrilineages in Macaques and Vervet Monkeys; no index entry for 'superior' or 'superiority.'.
Genetics, 2nd edition; Robert F. Weaver, Philip W. Hedrick.
glossary entry for 'dominant:' an allele or trait that expresses its phenotype when heterozygous with a recessive allele; for example, A is dominant over a because the phenotypes of AA and Aa are the same.
No glossary or index entry for 'superior' or 'superiority.'
Animal Physiology: Mechanisms and Adaptations, 5th edition; David Randall, Warren Burggren, Kathleen French.
no glossary or index entry for 'dominant' or 'dominance;' no glossary entry for 'superior' or 'superiority;' index entries related to 'superiority' show only 'superior culliculus,' an anatomic description.
Introduction to Microbiology, 2nd edtition; John L. Ingraham, Catherine A. Ingraham.
No glossary or index entries for 'dominant,' 'dominance,' 'superior,' or 'superiority.'

Those are the books I can reach without leaving my chair. I could give you a dozen others (and in proper citation format) if I gave enough of a damn. I'm not a PhD, but I've read a hell of a lot of biology books cover-to-cover, talked to a lot of PhD biology professors (including specifically about these terms), and graduated with a degree in biology. I suspect if you asked the authors you cited about their use of the term 'superior,' they would sheepishly admit that they had other, more important things on their minds in getting the paper published and used the term coloquially without thinking.

Last edited by LKL on 02 Nov 2012, 6:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.

And, the last time I checked, pointing out examples of people using a particular word incorrectly didn't prove that the word wasn't being used incorrectly, even if the people using the word incorrectly happened to be biologists.

If language worked like that, we'd have to re-write the entire dictionary every time a high school freshmen turned in a term paper.

People using a word incorrectly doesn't do didley to change the actual and correct meaning of the word in question.

http://www.reference.com/motif/Literatu ... erary-tone

**sigh**

Apparently a few other people used the term colloquially without thinking as well.

http://scholar.google.no/scholar?start= ... as_sdt=0,5

http://scholar.google.no/scholar?start= ... as_sdt=0,5

http://scholar.google.no/scholar?q=%22s ... _sdt=0%2C5

All of those are obviously not relevant but quite a few are.

Looking at the first few references for each page:

superior is being used as a technological term, not a biological one.


anatomical definitions and a discussion of eugenics.


'superior' used in the context of 'more fit,' which is the closest you've come to a relevant use of the term (though still imprecise).

And you can post 5,891 articles covering the works of 25 Nobel laureates, and I would still win this discussion because I have already demonstrated that your definition of "superiority/inferiority" and "dominance" is not universally shared by biologists. And thus, your claim lacks empirical validity.

This claim:



.. is false unless you claim that the authors of my previously posted are not biologists (and by your own admission, they are more scientifically qualified than you in the field of biology)... regardless of how many books you can reach without leaving your chair.

Hmm, you do have a point. I will rephrase:

Note that there is NO definition relevant to this discussion, because real biologists do not speak in terms of 'superiority' as being anything other than location, except when they are being careless with their terms.

feel better?

Yes, I feel better knowing that a random poster on WP considers herself superior to the work of full time scientists in the field of biology.

Peer review > PPR debate.

Oh, and I am still waiting for an elaboration on the "evo-psych BS" part...

At this point its hard to tell. I think its still very patriarchal, but I don't think we should shift to absolute matriarchy anymore than absolute patriarchy. What we really need is balance. Part of the reason why I think there's so many relationship issues is we've neglected the feminine for so long that men project too many expectations onto women, as some sort of demi-god in the flesh, to fulfill the role of divine femininity that's currently lacking in the western psyche. I'm all for the return of Gaia, but that doesn't mean I want Poseidon has to leave.

This. Pray tell me where this magic world is where I'll get free privileges and no dangers.

I think if a matriarchy actually existed most men would find it awesome.

Here where I live there is sort of a Matriarchy,it's the Grannies,no one opposes a Granny,never.And they are tough as old tree roots,the man at the hardware store told me a teenager broke into his Grandma's house,the lady weighs 90lbs dripping wet,the burglar was unarmed(and stupid),Granny got to the cast iron skillet,the burglar left in an ambulance.

It's a bit like that here; the women are tough because they have to be. They have to do all the housework and work full time. The men have an 'old fashioned' laziness when it comes to the details of living, especially with the household funds, so the women manage that. Having to do everything does not mean you are in charge, though. They do become very intimidating, powerful people when they're older, but that's after a lifetime of drudgery.

Norway.

Or, if you live to be 70, then you can get your social security.

So now you think you can read my mind too... What the f**k ever.

tone   [tohn] noun, verb, toned, ton·ing.
noun
1.
any sound considered with reference to its quality, pitch, strength, source, etc.: shrill tones.
2.
quality or character of sound.
3.
vocal sound; the sound made by vibrating muscular bands in the larynx.
4.
a particular quality, way of sounding, modulation, or intonation of the voice as expressive of some meaning, feeling, spirit, etc.: a tone of command.
5.
an accent peculiar to a person, people, locality, etc., or a characteristic mode of sounding words in speech.

OH LOOK, according to, oh, I dunno, just the f*****g DICTIONARY, TONE has to do with SOUND, which is how I was using it. I can't detect changes in the sound of one's voice thru text. SHOW ME SOMEONE WHO CAN.

Now who's redefining what?