Can anyone explain to me how the fear of (else the roundabout concern that) “women are taking over and are destroying the core of masculinity” is in fact not a communal projection of personally held aspirations by a certain male faction in society, one composed of individuals that themselves desire to be domineering over all others - women very much here included as those whom they deem themselves entitled to subjugate? Entitled by Nature, by God, it doesn't much here matter. — javra

"if women stopped wanting to date gang members, guys would stop joining." That's obviously a bit simplistic, (men also join for the status they receive from other men), but I think her point had some merit. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Here some illustrations of the general thesis that masculinity is defined by women. It is not even controversial in bio-evolutionary circles; the mating ritual quite frequently following the general pattern of male performance and female judging and prize-giving.

Can anyone explain to me how the male desire to dominate is other than a performance intended to attract a mate?

Here some illustrations of the general thesis that masculinity is defined by women. — unenlightened

Men who are overly preoccupied with pandering to women are hardly ever taken seriously by their male peers. The classic "white knight" / "pretty boy" is seen as dainty, vain and well, useless - not manly.

Manliness is historically characterized by the ability to provide protection against external threats, and as that protection progressively required more and more cooperation between men, men were the primary guarantors that men continued to be capable of performing this task.

Can anyone explain to me how the male desire to dominate is other than a performance intended to attract a mate? — unenlightened

Survival first and foremost, and procreation, comfort and pleasure second. That's obviously not just a male desire. Dominance heirarchies are an almost universal thing among living beings, and they're certainly present among women as well. The strongest cub gets the most milk.


The acceptance by male peers in the context of a masculine environment is actually instrumental to men's long-term psychological well-being. Father-son bonding can create such an experience, but generally a wider context is needed.

Rituals that mark boys' transition into manhood in large part are meant to accomodate this, and the absence of it in today's society probably accounts for much of the 'masculinity crisis'.

Men who never experience it will become 'unproven men' - men who are fundamentally insecure about their manliness, and try to repair that wound in unconstructive ways; some become violent, others become resentful, overly womanizing, etc.

Men who are overly preoccupied with pandering to women are hardly ever taken seriously by their male peers. The classic "white knight" / "pretty boy" is seen as dainty, vain and well, useless - not manly. — Tzeentch

You misunderstand me. Women prefer gang members. They don't choose pretty boys, they choose fighters. Women have bloodlust; look at the audience for men's boxing to see it.

And if they should change their preference, then they are "destroying the core of masculinity”.

Notice the knot in the complaint, there. Women dominate because they choose to be dominated and if they should choose not to be dominated they are trying to dominate. Men are pitiable, either way.

Did you always think like this?

Sorry, think like what?

Edit:
Conveniently, here, from another thread is about what I think:

I thought it was widely known that civilization, meaning a sedentary society built on intensive agriculture and characterized by social stratification and state institutions, has usually resulted in an oppression of women much worse than they experienced in hunter-gatherer societies. It happens that way for various reasons, including property and inheritance, which requires the control of reproduction. Even if men were dominant in many cases in earlier societies, in civilized society this was intensified and institutionalized.

I mean, this seems to be the most common view among anthropologists and in associated disciplines, so assertions to the contrary probably need some kind of support, rather than just intuition. — Jamal

Enjoy it while you can. — Tobias

I would prefer not to, but ...

And thus spoke the little old woman: You go to women? Do not forget the whip! — Thus Spoke Zarathustra

It delights me to note from year to year how long it takes for much that happens to one to become inner experience. It is only in old age that this process is completed, and for this reason it is right and proper to grow truly old, despite the less pleasant reverse side in the shape of infirmity. It seems to be that this is true even in matters of the intellect, not only in the emotional life. — Letter to Freud

Yeah I agree with @Jamal's comment. It's a long way from psychological angle you took though right? I'm mostly reacting to "Men are pitiful", it doesn't seem like the kind of idea you just stumble into as a bloke. Though I did read it as wordplay, as in "to be pitied" {sardonically} and "pathetic".

Yeah I agree with Jamal's comment. It's a long way from psychological angle you took though right? I'm mostly reacting to "Men are pitiful", it doesn't seem like the kind of idea you just stumble into as a bloke. Though I did read it as wordplay, as in "to be pitied" {sardonically} and "pathetic". — fdrake

Yes, I was pointing out the rather strange way that supposedly naturally dominant men complain about being dominated by their inferiors. Must be them damn commies again, taking over the humanities.

Niet, danken. My charisma suffices.

You misunderstand me. Women prefer gang members. They don't choose pretty boys, they choose fighters. Women have bloodlust; look at the audience for men's boxing to see it.

And if they should change their preference, then they are "destroying the core of masculinity”.

Notice the knot in the complaint, there. Women dominate because they choose to be dominated and if they should choose not to be dominated they are trying to dominate. Men are pitiful, either way. — unenlightened

I have a seriously hard time figuring out whether you're being sarcistic or not, and/or exactly whose argument you're responding to.

Must be them damn commies again, taking over the humanities. — unenlightened

I wish the humanities were full of commies.

I have a seriously hard time figuring out whether you're being sarcistic or not, and/or exactly whose argument you're responding to. — Tzeentch

It seems you're not alone there. I'm not sure if my thoughts are too complex or merely incoherent. But can you see the commonality between the 2 quotes that I was responding to?

I'm not sure if my thoughts are too complex or merely incoherent. — unenlightened

I don't think they're incoherent, they're just unsystematic. I think you've put a lot of ideas into a very small space.

Apparently the British Celts didn't have male dominated societies.. How would you account for cultures like their's?

I think you've put a lot of ideas into a very small space. — fdrake

I can certainly plead guilty there; I don't like writing, so I try to be brief, and make every word count. Also on this topic my thinking is unconventional in some ways, and liable to rub everyone up the wrong way who wants me to be either on their side or on the 'other' side. Thus I am against the patriarchy, and capitalist society in general, but I blame women equally if not more than men for it. Like 'what do you expect, girls, if that's what you go for?'

Thus I am against the patriarchy, and capitalist society in general, but I blame women equally if not more than men for it. Like 'what do you expect, girls, if that's what you go for?' — unenlightened

I think that's a bit harsh.

People do as they are taught, and if you teach kids to idolize petty criminals then that's what they'll desire and aspire to be like.

The pattern of strong female kinship connections that the researchers found does not necessarily imply that women also held formal positions of political power, called matriarchy.

But it does suggest that women had some control of land and property, as well as strong social support, making Britain's Celtic society "more egalitarian than the Roman world," said study co-author and Bournemouth University archaeologist Miles Russell.

"When the Romans arrived, they were astonished to find women occupying positions of power," Russell said.

Frank's link.

It suggests very strongly a matrilineal society at least, and in such a system a man's loyalties are to his sister's children, not to those he may have fathered. This is quite difficult to understand from here. It means there is no reason to control female sexual activity. This is the radical biological inequality I mentioned earlier - that women automatically know their off-spring whereas men do not. And that indicates that matrilineal society is the more natural way to organise society.
One has to cast off notions of the virtue of monogamy and virginity to begin to get an understanding of such a world, because these, and particularly the control of women's sex lives by men are the absolutely necessary ingredients that make a patrilineal system possible.

People do as they are taught, and if you teach kids to idolize petty criminals then that's what they'll desire and aspire to be like. — Tzeentch

Of course. We are not very much in control of our lives or our identities. But if you want change, you have to take responsibility.

I can certainly plead guilty there; I don't like writing, so I try to be brief, and make every word count. — unenlightened

It shows and they do. I've always gotten a lot from reading your posts. I think of you as much more of a gadfly than a systems builder.

Also on this topic my thinking is unconventional in some ways, and liable to rub everyone up the wrong way who wants me to be either on their side or on the 'other' side. — unenlightened

Good!

Thus I am against the patriarchy, and capitalist society in general, but I blame women equally if not more than men for it. Like 'what do you expect, girls, if that's what you go for?' — unenlightened

Yeah this stuff is relational and gender stuff tends to come in man:woman dyads, if there's a shitty man thing there's a corollary shitty woman thing. I really like Audre Lorde on this, her book "Sister Outsider", she describes having made the choice to raise her boy as a patriarch - showing little to no interest in his emotional development -, without realising it. It took her a lot of effort to make other choices and raise him non-standardly {this was 1970-1980s}. Bell Hooks writes similarly about her implicit demands for the flavour of maleness she's spent her career criticising from her partners, and wrestling with it.

It's very related to @Tobias OP's framing isn't it? We're in a position, I imagine throughout the political north, where the chat about gender is post-feminist - equality, interchangeability, no gendered essence associated with family roles - but the underlying norms, dare I say libidinal formations, are explosively contrary. Some examples.

This is a world where women may feel the need to forgo makeup at work to prove they're not just there because they're pretty but feel most comfortable being meticulously feminine looking regardless. And one where the feminine-construed virtues of community and collaboration are lauded for efficiency in the workplace, as exemplary leader-followers, but the self sacrifice embodying those virtues requires does not get anyone a leadership role. It gets you stepped on.

It's similarly a world which values men when they identify stoically with their functions - work, "providing a space" - , but requires men to be unstoic for their correct execution. It's a world where you are asked to be emotionally available and kind, but strike fear in strangers if you're seen being kind to them.

Norms regarding sex and attraction are particularly contrary. Here's an anecdote. I saw a bloke flirting with an impossibly drunk tourist girl outside a bar, he kept about 2m distance from her, she was quite uncomfortable and said "I don't want to continue talking with you". He laughed it off and continued talking, maintaining that distance. She got quite scared. So I went over to talk with both of them and deescalated the situation. She then touched me quite inappropriately. It was so bizarre, having "protected" her from a bloke that kept 2m distance, only to have her touch me in the way she was afraid of being touched.

I think a good deal of this comes down to norms regarding men didn't get updated by years of successful feminist consciousness raising, they were largely retained. Which isn't exactly "the feminists" fault, it's just the movement was never designed to reevaluate many social norms regarding men. Just ones that were seen to disempower women. I'm not saying it's a "power grab", I'm saying the revolution wasn't total and it needs to be for its own sake.

I suppose another aspect is that you can find relics of 1960s-1980s academic essentialisms in how people treat gender in liberal public discourse - women get defined through their subordinate role to men, to be a woman is to have patriarchal oppression experiences by men, and to be a man is to be a domineering oppressor. Hilariously the right uses the same essentialisms and either treats them as natural+benign or to be celebrated and escalated.

I don't know. In Bronze Age societies, the high priestess was usually the king's daughter. The temple would house women who had sex for a living. The character who transforms the wildman Enkidu into a civilized person is a temple prostitute.

I think the patriarchy being talked about in this thread is more Iron Age. A whole other civilized world existed before the Greco-Roman world we know so much about. I wouldn't jump from hunter-gatherers to the Iron Age, in other words.

I don't know. — frank

I don't know what you don't know. If I have said something you disagree with, based on the article you linked, then perhaps you can clarify, taking account of that DNA evidence that I think supports and justifies my position.

I don't know what you don't know. If I have said something you disagree with, based on the article you linked, then perhaps you can clarify, taking account of that DNA evidence that I think supports and justifies my position. — unenlightened

The Celts were as civilized as anybody else in the Roman world. Virgil was Celt.

I don't think masculinity needs a 'modern update' - modernity seems to have no clue about masculinity (or just about anything it is doing in general, for that matter). It's like a dog chasing its own tail.

You'd get a healthier picture of masculinity by reading some of the classics.

Think for a moment, what public figure is going to teach you or me about masculinity? Trump? Biden? Musk? Bezos? Etc. etc.

Wouldn't you just laugh at the pretension? Being taught about masculinity by a society that so obviously doesn't possess any.

Yeah this stuff is relational and gender stuff tends to come in man:woman dyads, if there's a shitty man thing there's a corollary shitty woman thing. I really like Audre Lord on this, her book "Sister Outsider", she describes having made the choice to raise her boy as a patriarch - showing little to no interest in his emotional development -, without realising it. It took her a lot of effort to make other choices and raise him non-standardly {this was 1970-1980s}. Bell Hooks writes similarly about her implicit demands for the flavour of maleness she's spent her career criticising from her partners, and wrestling with it. — fdrake

We've been frequenting the same library! We are (hopefully) in transition, and not all at the same speed, so all these hypocrisies and contradictions, social and psychological are to be expected.

Patriarchy is one of a number of social schemes. The British Celtic and Navajo schemes are examples of alternatives. Suppose patriarchy won out by a kind of natural selection? It offered some advantage? If that's true, and we're now transitioning to some other scheme, we might want to think about what we're losing when patriarchy declines. Perhaps it's not a matter of egos, or ownership. Maybe it was about strong family units that gave some kind of robustness to society. The Iron Age was a hard time to be alive, so maybe that selected for patriarchy.

If that's true, then it may be that moralizing about it is irrelevant. If we escaped patriarchy, it's because conditions allowed creativity that didn't exist for our forebears.

@Tobias
I have a hypothesis for you. Patriarchy offered a survival advantage to societies by providing strong family units. In societies where neoliberalism became rooted, priorities shifted from the well-being of families (which was important after the depression and WW2) to the welfare of financial institutions. This created a sense of vulnerability in the labor pool. At the time, fighting the power of unions was seen as paramount to economic stability. But years later, large holes began to appear in the social safety net for some, particularly Americans.

Now look at JD Vance, the vice-president of the US. His outlook was shaped by his childhood experiences with the disintegration of the family unit. His mother was a drug addict. He was raised by his grandmother. He places a lot of importance on the welfare of children. He might fit into a larger conservative framework that probably is a little retrogressive.

Though we may be facing challenges in the domain of the male persona, blaming the political shift on this psychological issue would be to fail to see the tangible problems causing stress. What nobody outside the US seems to want to digest is that immigration control and tariffs are potentially beneficial to American labor. There's a real problem that this administration has done more to fix than generations of left-center politicians. In other words, I'm pushing for looking at the real problems on the table.

Suppose patriarchy won out by a kind of natural selection? It offered some advantage? If that's true, and we're now transitioning to some other scheme, we might want to think about what we're losing when patriarchy declines. — frank

Can you actually make that argument rather than asking us to assume it?

Suppose instead that cultures are in a prisoner's dilemma situation such that in a competition between a Celtic society and a patriarchal Roman society, the patriarchy wins, but is itself unstable in the long term because when the whole world is patriarchal, the conflict turns inevitably inwards. We might rather think about all that we have lost from our lack of restraint. I think history can be read in this way, as a sequence of martial triumphs followed by decay and collapse.

Can you actually make that argument rather than asking us to assume it? — unenlightened

In the Bronze Age, the most important commodity, food, was not private property. Land wasn't. People worked in the fields and brought their produce into the temple to be divided by the priests. It's called a temple economy. There was no free market. How patriarchal were they? We can only speculate. In the opening scene of the epic of Gilgamesh, the people of Ur are praying to the Sun god to help them because Gilgamesh, their king, is making all the men work hard, and he's having sex with all the women. The Sun god hands the problem off to a female divinity, the fertility goddess. She makes a man out of clay and sets him roam like a wildman. In due course, the wildman is tamed by the temple prostitute. This wildman eventually becomes the best friend and homosexual lover of Gilgamesh.

So we have a bisexual king, the one who initiates wildmen into a civilized state is a prostitute. One of the most important deities is female. In real life, the leader of the temple, where the food is divided up, is the King's daughter. I'm not suggesting that women had equal rights in this society. I doubt anybody had any rights per se. But this is not patriarchy as we know it.

The conditions you describe for the genesis of patriarchy, where private ownership drives men to know who their offspring are, didn't exist until the Iron Age. Our knowledge of the Iron Age is not foggy. We know it pretty well, and though a case could be made for what you described, if would be fairly flimsy.

All we know is that as the dust cleared from the Bronze Age collapse, patriarchy had become normal. From early accounts, we know this was a very dangerous world to live in. No one travelled around. You just stayed close to your clan.

So maybe ownership played a part. Maybe patriarchy became the dominant cultural scheme for other reasons. I'm speculating just as you are.

We are (hopefully) in transition, and not all at the same speed, so all these hypocrisies and contradictions, social and psychological are to be expected. — unenlightened

Good good. They feel at a breaking point right now. But they have for a decade.

You'd get a healthier picture of masculinity by reading some of the classics. — Tzeentch

Nah. I've got a plenty healthy conception of masculinity. I know what it is, what's expected of a man, and when that's bullshit. I'm of the opinion that virtues aren't gendered, just expectations are. Some virtues are expected of men and some of women, but it's good for everyone to have every virtue.

Think for a moment, what public figure is going to teach you or me about masculinity? Trump? Biden? Musk? Bezos? Etc. etc. — Tzeentch

They do teach you about masculinity though. On a societal level. People do use them as role models, and what they make normal through how they act + their power is literally teaching people about masculinity. Not that everyone accepts it.

You can see a lot of masculine virtues in Trump, Musk, Bezos. I think Biden's reputation of floundering senility renders him impotent, few people have been as symbolically castrated as Biden in recent years.

Can anyone explain to me how the male desire to dominate is other than a performance intended to attract a mate? — unenlightened

I could explain my views on why it’s not completely a product of Darwinian sexual selection. But sexual selection of course plays a very large role. I did just say “of course”, right?

We as a western society at large – men and women alike – by in large worship authoritarian violence. If we didn’t about half or so of the movies and songs that get our attention nowadays wouldn’t exist, ‘cuz they wouldn’t have an audience and so wouldn’t make any money. Think of movies the glorify criminals and their behavior; songs with push the norm of pimps and their bitches; etc. And with authoritarian power comes control of money. And with control of money comes improved stability of physical being, including bread to put on the table. Which comes in handy for raising one’s young – this being in addition to the perceived ability of the authoritarian other to better defend the nest, so to speak. Plus, the demise of any authoritarian order brings with it tentative instability, and who wants instability to occur? So then authoritarian order is what ought to be preserved! So yes, not all, but a good sum of women will choose, and find attractive, the more authoritarian asshole as a mate (I’m guessing: and will at such moment of choice believe this authoritarian partner to be so to others but not to her).

Of course, if all women worldwide were to miraculously stop finding authoritarian assholes attractive and mating with such, this characteristic would stop proliferating in humanity soon enough. How many women consider males who un-consensually “grab women by their pussies” to be, at worst, OK people to have in society? Haven’t counted but women too elected just such an individual into power.

I could go on. But, at the end of the day, I’m no more about “it's all the women’s fault” as I am about “it's all the men’s fault”. If there’s problems with society, then there will be some faction(s) of society at fault for it, no doubt. I’ll suggest that the fault here lies with both the male and the female assholes of the world, this in part, and in other part with all the male and female non-assholes of the world for not speaking up.

Complex issue, but yea, sexual selection hasn’t stopped operating in our human species of animal.

In the Bronze Age, the most important commodity, food, was not private property. Land wasn't. People worked in the fields and brought their produce into the temple to be divided by the priests. It's called a temple economy. — frank

Citations? I can't find much, myself.

Mesopotamian empires period (2350-1750 BC). Reforms towards more inclusive political institutions were accompanied by a shift towards stronger farmers’ rights on land and a larger provision of public goods, especially those most valued by the citizens, i.e., conscripted army.

https://ehs.org.uk/the-origins-of-political-and-property-rights-in-bronze-age-mesopotamia/

Nothing much for Britain, but some indications here: https://historicengland.org.uk/images-books/publications/dssg-agriculture/heag238-agriculture-ssg/