Why Women Cheer Patriarchy

We have all heard women cheerfully explain why patriarchy is good for women, men, and society as a whole, and we have all been equally puzzled by that cheerfulness. Why do women cheer patriarchy?

The whole thing boils down to this: women know they can climb to the top if they play their cards right. Men love beautiful women, and there aren't that many of them; women love beautiful things, and there aren't that many of them either. Put the two together and you get a fierce competition for available resources and the owners of those resources (for although beauty should be married to the owner of the moneybag, it is too often attached to the moneybag instead).

Feminism challenges patriarchy because of what it does to the women at the bottom. Beautiful women may get what they want, but their plainer sisters aren't always that fortunate. Without beauty to use as a means to influence decision making, these women will experience what men without resources experience daily: they are pushed aside as inconsequential, and more than one has had her share of violence.

Perhaps we really shouldn't be talking about the rule of the fathers, for patriarchy looks a whole lot like the rule of the bold and the beautiful, which is why feminism can't conquer it alone. Women who challenge a power structure that is founded on the belief that winners take it all aren't going to be cheered by those who have it all. In order to dismantle the power structure we need more than just one movement; we need men and women willing to move towards a just society.

Men and women who refuse to play along, do not seek what the bold and the beautiful seek. They look for partners who share their values and goals. This, of course, is an affront to patriarchy that loves all that shines, be it gold or eyes. If having it all isn't the most important thing in the world, those who have it all aren't all that important. In fact they are fools who have traded love for the lure of material considerations and fleshly delights, things that vanish with time.

But there is one more system to consider: religious patriarchy. Religious patriarchy differs from the secular in one important aspect: it rejects the life of pleasure in favor of absolute power. The religious know the influence beautiful women have on men; anyone can read about Gideon and Delilah and draw their own conclusions. Hence they hide the women and shame the men. If the bold aren't allowed to be bold (for money exists only to enrich the religious leaders), and the beautiful are tucked away, nothing hinders the absolute power of the religious leaders, who are - naturally - all men.

Because the freedom to follow one's conscience threatens religious patriarchy, rigid gender roles are created to ensure that people will remain within the narrow perimeters. Faith and fear are used to shame anyone who strays. In the world of religious patriarchy, feminism becomes an unparalleled evil, and a marriage of equals becomes a threat to the very existence of society, although, in reality, they threaten only the power of the religious leaders.

Why women cheer religious patriarchy isn't all that hard to understand. When obedience is the highest virtue, and only virtue will give the reward of eternal life, anyone is willing to put up with some measure of injustice. But what if religious patriarchy is only a dark cloak that hides an insatiable hunger for earthly power? What if justice is the true virtue, and these women are giving up their reward out of fear? What if these women are cheering a system that will incur God's wrath?

Patriarchy is one of the oldest excuses for injustice, whether it comes in the form of hedonism or asceticism. In our quest for more for me, we sacrifice that which matters the most: ourselves. Aren't we worth fighting for?