Essay On Patriarchy

How have the traits of patriarchy manifested in my familial and personal life?

Note: This is schoolwork I’ve transcribed, and some details have been omitted for my privacy. 

By Cindy

Today, my mother has asked me how I slept, and I told her I’ve slept well. Two days earlier, due to me staying awake past 12AM, she wasn’t able to sleep due to my room’s light, but she still forgave me. With this phrase, I’d like to try and encapsulate the feeling behind the following words, which is love for my mother.

For many years now, the feminist movement has grown quite popular, and not without reason: it is a movement that seeks the absolute liberation of a part of the population oppressed by the hand, not of the social construct of gender, but by its ideological horsemen of death: misogyny, machismo, chauvinism, apathy; along with its creators, perpetrators and perpetuators, the men. These are related to more things, but for this essay, I shall speak only on what I believe to know aptly, which is the patriarchy.

We’ll first need an appropriate starting point in order to advance toward the complex, which we have just conveniently heard of: The patriarchy. Now, what is it? The term comes from Friedrich Engels, who coined it in his work “The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State”, where it was defined as the system of oppression of most antiquity: where man situates himself above the woman, from where he holds dominion over her; however, the feminists would go on to develop this concept further, Gerda Lerner saying that it is “The manifestation and institutionalization of male dominance over women and children of the family, and the amplification of that dominion over the women of society in general.”

Having this conceptual base in mind, it is urgent to present apt examples of the reality, exactitude and precision of Lerner’s asseveration regarding it. Let’s start with the most obvious and fundamental example for me, the writer of this essay: The fact that I was born a man; it is therefore worth mentioning that, thanks to the existence of the patriarchy, I find myself in a privileged position relative to women, *only* for being a man. Not because of talent, virtue, capability, but for being a *man*. Due to this privilege, there is not as much constraint on men as women, less restrictions are placed on them, they are allowed to grow without maturing, with, for example, the phrase “boys will be boys”, a manner of excusing the misbehavior believed to be inherent in men, and not in the languid rules of their upbringing.

When young and when adults, men perceive themselves as some sort of model of logic and maturity purely by nature (a terrible falsehood!), they call themselves protectors, providers and, therefore, as the only people who should occupy positions of authority (part of the “glass ceiling phenomenon), this in contrast with how women in society are treated and perceived. Stalking, “It was her fault”, Femicide, “they shouldn’t have defied him”; over any injustice, they immediately blame the woman for the acts of the man. But “what is the glass ceiling?”. It is the invisible (or glassy,) barrier that prevents women from climbing up the workplace hierarchy, due to the patriarchal influence on thought. 

Let us return to my first proposition, which says that I as a man, have privilege. I have said that as men, we are not constrained in the same way as women, and this lack of constraints favors the bestowal of positions of authority to men and not women. A usual counterargument is that men are also limited in their lives, and more forcefully: not being able to talk about their emotions, suffering in silence, having to carry the responsibility of providing, having to appeal to the traditional definition of manhood, reasons that successively become pettier than the last, which may be refuted by pointing to the inventor of these notions, and the one who forces himself to follow them like a lamb; it is overstood that I think they are one and the same and they are men. In pursuit to maintain their position of power, men must establish a twofold hierarchy to thus extend their reign: the hierarchy of men within society, whose purpose is to keep the brainwashed men as subordinate followers, and the hierarchy of these two genders: men and women, the latter serving to divert the attention of the working class men toward women instead of the government or, if we’re feeling ambitious, the bourgeoisie. In addition, the burden of hate usually destined for the oppressor, is conveniently directed to the oppressed. Regular hatred of women is even made out to be normal, their stereotyping as crazy, emotional, submissive, traitorous, whiny; this with the purpose of fitting in with the other men by sharing an enemy in common: women. 

This, if you'd allow, I’d like to demonstrate through an interaction I had, which exemplifies this behavior perfectly, though I use it not to contribute to the point given its anecdotal nature, but to recount a related experience. I stood in front of the tarpaulin chessboard they’d set some weeks ago as part of the sports club recruitment here at my campus, where I was able to watch a chess game alongside a few more men. Near the end of this, I was next to some of them, who spoke of chess, and I asked them questions about it. One of them began to speak about how, in the social sciences campus of my university, there was a large quantity of women in comparison to our campus (the arts, architecture and design campus). This was by no means an abnormal observation, it was a recognition that in this campus, there are effectively a lot of men, (by virtue, probably, of containing the engineering campus); he went on, but he mentioned how women seem to like social sciences, letters, things of this nature, better than engineering or arts. These statements don’t have much wrong with them. It was however the last thing he said, which confused me: “and then women complain when they get paid less!” I, of course, asked him what he meant, mainly to know what made him say such an absurdity, to then express that in fact, the wage gap comes from the discrimination of women at the workplace. But he went silent, then babbled that “they [the men who were with us] know what I’m talking about”. Again, I shall now say this does not serve as a solid base for any broad argument due to the fact that is easily falsifiable, but what the man who said such nonsense and retreated with cowardice is real: the wage gap, along with the way in which this phenomenon is perceived by the population. They see it as a fact that women get paid less for the work they do, and that men somehow always take “riskier” or “better paid” jobs by nature; and along with his shamelessness, the men who were present appeared deaf: they said nothing against it. 

This latter thing is what is called the “patriarchal pact”, the silence and complicity of a man before the violence of another. Some will no doubt say that words are not an act of violence, due to no physical harm coming to a person due to them; but you can observe now, in September of 2024, how violent words can be when used by a person who has a position of power over another group, as small as it may be. With this I refer to the hateful rhetoric and discrimination of the Haitian people, who stand accused of killing and eating their pets due to their home’s famines. This has resulted in a campaign of hatred that has already caused the deaths of cats and the publication of inflammatory news. (Morphet & Reilly, 2024) This use of words, no matter how small they are, have a political impact on the world. Therefore, the act of speaking oppressively of an oppressed population, though it causes not any immediate physical harm, if left unrefuted, leads to real and lasting damage being inflicted on said group. Though if we want to look at an example that most easily demonstrates my point, we shall look at the cases where a man from a given family sexually assaults one of their family members, a woman or little girl, and said family attempts to hide this fact and speak nothing of it. The silence of the family consequently obscures the violent act of the man and protects him, in the same way in which the silence of the two men to my right shielded the coward from criticism. 

In conclusion, I think the patriarchy has influenced my life a great deal, due to the fact I was born part of it. I am part of a privileged population, and I was therefore influenced by its ideas of what is right when I was little, from which I had to separate from as I grew and learned for myself it was naught but an illusion. In spite of this, it doesn’t affect me nearly in the same way as it affects women who, day by day, have to walk the streets with fear and be cautious with men and that, despite this precaution, fear and deterrent measures in the shape of self-defense weapons, they end up being murdered just for existing beyond the working day. In the way in which, for every dollar a man makes, a woman makes 54 cents (Parker & Tyson, 2019); for every day that women suffer under men's societal oppression, men suffer only half of it. 

Addendum:

If it weren't obvious beforehand, I am passionate about this topic. I hope that reading this has been satisfactory. But, as a final note, I would like to say that the reason why I am compelled to be an advocate for women’s rights is my mother, who did much of the work of raising me, and for that I am thankful beyond words. For the very same reason, I dedicate this text to her. 

Every day, more terrible things happen to more women, especially in this city, and one must not stay quiet in these subjects, they must be combatted through dialogue; this goes for men especially, who are the supposed protectors of women, kill and abuse them.

References:

1. Morphet, J. y Reilly, P. (2024). Post witnesses Haitian motorist making illegal turn in Springfield, Ohio, smashes into mom driving with autistic daughter, New York Post en el Viernes 13 de Septiembre de 2024. Available at: https://nypost.com/2024/09/13/us-news/haitian-driver-makes-illegal-turn-in-springfield-oh-smashes-into-moms-truck-with-autistic-daughter-in-back/ [Accessed 15 September 2024] 2. Parker, C. y Tyson, L. (2019). An economist explains why women are paid less, World Economic Forum en el Viernes 8 de Marzo de 2019. Available at: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/03/an-economist-explains-why-women-get-paid-less/ [Accessed 15 September 2024]

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English translation! Hope you enjoyed the read. Send any counterarguments (there are plenty of things to pick at here) through comments. If I ever link my email in this blog, make sure to send a message there. If you are overtly hateful of women, or myself, I shan't take the time to argue with you seriously and will send a message containing an image of a brick back to you.

With that said,

Achtung. Achtung.

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