https://www.space.com/gravitational-waves-astronomers-why-so-excited?utm_content=space.com&utm_campaign=socialflow&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&fbclid=IwAR3b-iXwDkNyPYphpvQ9RdV0Dl7_IxVaT1Nhgzv2VQnVDVQbeNJQgX-WnjI

Completely off topic. It's not a telescope.

I understand in individual cases actual democracy can be inconvenient — Baden

And fragile.

Your claim was that the fundamental driver was uncertainty of fatherhood. But apparently social bonds of mutual trust and fidelity are more important. — Tzeentch

*Sigh*. Ask yourself why it is so important to prove me wrong? Because your criticisms are getting desperate and feeble.

DNA analysis is a rather recent option. Society is not therefore built around it. On the contrary, it is built around the state of affairs previously prevailing, which is (sorry to bore you) that men could not be certain of their offspring unless they could control women's sexual behaviour. Therefore, a patriarchal society can be expected to promote ideals of either monogamy or polygamy but almost certainly not polyandry.And this is what we find around the world, that polyandry is very very rare.

The promotion, or at least the enforcement of these ideals can be expected to be applied more rigorously to women than to men, and stories about men's needs, and their inability to control them completely will abound, and this is the beginning of the induction of rape culture, that sows fear in the minds of women, and downplays the responsibility of men.

But we are supposed to be discussing Matriarchy.

Imagine therefore, a society where no importance at all is placed on fatherhood.It is not even a thing to be named and talked about. A child's important male role models will be his maternal uncles, who will be part of the matriarchal family in a way that unrelated males who share the maternal bed from time to time are not.

Familial relations are not based on sex at all, in contrast to the patriarchal nuclear family which is founded and maintained entirely by the sexual relationship of mother and father. This makes for a much more stable and extended matrilineal family unit with a matriarch at it's head, with her adult children of both sexes, and the children of her daughters (her sons do not have children of their own, but are co-responsible for their sisters' children).

Sex, whether consensual or non-consensual, loses its importance socially. Rape as a weapon of war is completely disarmed and just looks silly.

The main point of going through all this is to emphasise that matriarchy is not at all a mirror image of patriarchy. We can argue about whether it might be better or worse in all sorts of ways from different points of view, but the main difficulty for people is to understand the necessities of the patriarchy that prevails at present, and take seriously the possibility of other ways of organising society.

Is there not a difference to you, between stopping and starting again, and stopping and never starting again? — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes, there is all the difference in the world. I know, because i have done both. The first is difficult and painful because one is in conflict the whole time, whereas the second is easy because there is no conflict.

One knows when there is no internal conflict. If one is unsure, there is conflict.

Stopping is like dots at the end of the sentence, or the fading out of the music as the end of the song. You can't be sure that the story has ended - yet. And "yet" can be postponed indefinitely. There's a nice complication. Arguably, the end of a narrative is always, in a sense, arbitrary. — Ludwig V

Not all songs fade out, the best reach a harmonic resolution that completes and satisfies. Not all lives peter out incomplete; not all stories end in dots of unfinished business and regrets.

"It was in that moment that Hirem Pawnitof, the highwayman, attained enlightenment."

"And they all lived happily ever after."

Indeed, democracy is a bad system when most of the population is insane.

Interesting how your can theoretically pardon yourself. Very ethically sound. — Benkei

There is an interesting aspect. Bobby Sands was a member of the IRA who died in prison on hunger strike while an elected member of the British parliament. I cannot help feeling that such an event as the election of a known criminal can only be understood as a democratic indictment of the democratic system itself. One has arrived at the borderline between normal politics and civil war. The winners of a civil war don't need to pardon themselves, because they are the lawmakers. It is the losers that need pardons.

Trump represents a constituency in rebellion against the government and the government needs to reach an agreement with that constituency one way or another. "Remember Bobby Sands!" became a slogan, and I always have. When a criminal gets elected, it is no good blaming the criminal. Something bigger than any individual is very wrong.

It looks to be an odd question, to me. If I asked how a map maps onto reality, the answer would seem to be 'by being an arrangement of symbols that corresponds to the arrangement of features of note in the world.' or something like. The proof of the map is that the competent orienteer can find his way to the local hostelry in unfamiliar territory without falling off a cliff or into the river.

Maps have legends, that explain the meaning of the symbols. Cliff, river, bridge, hostelry. Things important to the traveller from afar. The legend informs those unfamiliar with the map, about scale and so on, but tells them nothing about the territory. The map does that.

And so it surely is with language. One needs to know the legend, and one needs to read the arrangement of the words, and one needs the right map according to where one is.

Here are a couple of arrangements to compare:

1. Don't eat the yellow snow.
2. Eat the yellow snow.

I leave the interested reader to work out by practical experiment which arrangement provides the best guidance to travellers in Northern climes.

(Those who have read the later work of Philip K Dick may be aware that there is a tradition of feeding reindeer with amanita muscaria and drinking their urine to enjoy the psycho-active benefits of the mushrooms without the upset stomach that one gets from direct ingestion of them. This is a legend.)

I have a book on fungi from the good old days when men were men and women were grateful, that has infallible advice for telling poisonous from edible mushrooms: "Eat them, if you get sick or die, they are poisonous, and if not they are edible." They don't make books like that any more. This is a true story.

You have no proof. — frank

I have no proof that you just posted that. But evidently you did.

It’s also weird you’re calling it unresponsive to the situation like there is some objectively correct way to respond to situations. — Darkneos

Not objectively correct, nor subjectively correct, but socially correct. But you're right, I am weird. But I'm not alone.

All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything. — Shakespeare

I think you’re mistaken. I said I behave same no matter where I go, that “same” being who I am which is considerate. — Darkneos

Well if you are always considerate, again that is unresponsive to the situation; sometimes it is appropriate to be inconsiderate - to scammers and thieves for example.

I act the same no matter where I’m at, same with others, so how do they explain that. — Darkneos

I don't know how they would explain it, I put it down to either a complete lack of insight, or an inability to modify responses according to the environment. People who cannot shut up during the two minutes silence, or show some consideration for others in social situations generally are not likely to do well socially. If you cannot or will not modify your behaviour between a party and a funeral, then I pity you, but not very much, I'm afraid.

I'll just leave this here for reference:

https://www.studysmarter.co.uk/explanations/social-studies/social-institutions/construction-of-social-reality/

If your argument is that the uncertainty of fatherhood is the fundamental driver of human society for the past 2,500 years, then access to DNA testing should have to be revolutionary. But it turns out it's really not.

This isn't ridiculous - it's a strong indicator of whether your argument holds any merit. — Tzeentch

It is used in matrimonial disputes such as divorce where it has immediate financial consequences (property, that is). In normal relationships it would currently be a very damaging, insulting expression of distrust, because of the social expectation of sexual exclusivity that patriarchy depends on. Perhaps it will become a normal feature in time, it is still very new. It has been suggested that DNA screening become automatic at birth, but there are implications for insurance to be dealt with, and also privacy issues. If such were to happen, it might prove to be an equalising intervention, that would make possible an equal society, but I'm not holding my breath. It would certainly be a very complicated society in terms of family units, if it led to women being as openly unfaithful to their partners as men are.
Perhaps you could just think through the implications of things a bit before you start your revolution?

The idea of someone else coming into their lives and telling them what they can & can't do can trigger frustration. — Judaka

It's funny how this principle works to prevent regulation of companies, but somehow doesn't do the same for women's pregnant bodies, for example. In practice it always seems to protect companies, and never seems to protect individual humans at all.

Yes, yes. And you seem to believe that this is a fundamental driver of human behavior. — Tzeentch

No. it is a fundamental driver of the organisation of patriarchy. It is not a driver of the organisation of matriarchy.

Also, why is it an 'idiotic question' to ask whether you believe we currently live in a patriarchy? — Tzeentch

It is idiotic because we have been living in a patriarchal society for at least 2,500 years, and a brief glance at the makeup of any government you care to consider will confirm that we still are. As could be expected after a mere century or so of agitation for women's rights, and zero consideration of the obvious impossibility of equality for the reason already explained in tedious detail and repetition. An equal society with property inheritance is not possible, and property inheritance has not been abolished.

Now to your ridiculous argument that parents do not test their children's DNA, as if modern men do not care about their fatherhood! On the contrary, it is the result of the patriarchal society that we live in, whereby society is so structured as to control women's sexual behaviour sufficiently well that men are fairly confident, not always justifiably, of their fatherhood.

Enough idiotic questions, already. Do you understand that in general biological motherhood is known, whereas biological fatherhood is questionable, because infants appear from between the legs of the mother, and not from between the legs of the father? I say "in general" because surrogacy, gene splicing, babies swapped at birth, babies abandoned in baskets of rushes, and miraculous virgin births are also possibilities, allegedly.

Equal inheritance is the norm as far as I know. — Tzeentch

I'm talking about matriarchy, not equality.

Does equal inheritance not include patrilineal inheritance? I'm talking about history, and the legacy of history. I'm talking about royalty and nobility and nationality and people with names that inherit. I'm talking about incels and philosophy departments.

After the French revolution, equal inheritance became law. before that the firstborn male was usually the heir to the estate. The result of this after many generations was that land was so divided into tiny parcels, that was terribly inefficient, and measures had to be taken to consolidate ownership into usable holdings.

There has obviously been some movement in the last century towards equality of the sexes. It has obviously not been complete. But equality in the matter of inheritance still requires the social control of female sexual behaviour, for the reason stated. This is a simple matter of fact that I do not understand why you have difficulty accepting.

Don't you think that's a bit naive? Women can be just as possessive of their partners as men. — Tzeentch

That is not politics. Women can be just as anything you like as men, except just as unsure who their children are. That makes the big difference between matriarchy and patriarchy, not that people of either sex cannot be possessive or monogamous, but that it has no economic dynastic implications whether they are or not. The pressure is off .

Just swapping bodies is not what this is about. — Baden

Because matriarchy does not need to control sex. The difference that makes the difference is that man is born of woman so the woman knows her lineage with complete certainty, whereas for the male to have the same confidence requires that he control the woman's sex life. and hence all the related threads and their contortions of attempted justification of the status quo. In a matriarchy there is no sexual politics, in the sense that it does not ever matter who fucks who.

Can we really say that it ended then? — Metaphysician Undercover

Can we really say it began?

I wonder what you mean by "really say"? I did really write it, and it seems to me that a train can really stop, and then start again. A process like identification can begin, and can end, and can begin again. I can stop smoking and then start again, or I can stop smoking and never start again. what's the problem?

And how is it that the story itself is something other than the narrative? — Metaphysician Undercover

I have bee quite clear from the beginning that the thread and the topic is all narrative and none other.

- but walking the walk is something else. — Wayfarer

To walk to the very end of self is arduous; one tires, one is in pain, and it seems hopeless. and when all hope is exhausted, one lays down.

No one can logically rule out that I am the Lizard King and have knowledge not accessible to mere mortals.

Yet everyone does rule it out, in spite of my announcement above. Fools!

But the idea that reality is a simulation implies that there is a "higher reality" in which this simulation takes place. It is the scientific version of religious speculations about heaven and hell and eternity, etc. And has almost as much basis. The superstitions of those who think themselves immune from superstition are a wonder to behold.

Do I have the right not to shower alongside a fully physically appearing female who identifies as male? — Hanover

Given sex segregated showers I think you do. But given only non-sex- segregated showers, no you do not. It's a matter of what segregations are mandated and recognised in society. For sure there were times when facilities were race segregated, but times can change, so we can debate.


Mixed facilities are not all that uncommon.

You know nothing, but I am the Lizard King. Less of your presumptuous "we" when you dare to question yourself in public.

Researchers typically presume that stone projectiles buried alongside males are hunting tools but are less persuaded when projectiles are associated with females.

Your link.
The erasure of females in art, and science is very familiar, but in prehistory — I should have expected it, but didn't.
Men have bullets, women have beads, because you can't shoot berries. And that's why they don't call projectile weapons "equalisers".

{The butterfly affect is of course the feeling that accompanies the fluttering of strictly feminine false eyelashes at a manly man, a small act that can result in a whole new dynasty.}

- clothes simply enable people to be disgusting. — Merkwurdichliebe

You may think that, but I think that clothes enable the disgust. What is hidden becomes emotionally charged. If you go to life drawing class, you will see naked men and women of all kinds, fat and thin, hairy and smooth, young and old, light and dark, whole and deformed or scarred or mutilated. All just something to sketch or paint. Disgust is a limitation to be overcome. One may not like blue cheese, but to be disgusted by it is never to find out.

Indeed I have already cited evidence from the Naturist movement that breaking the nudity taboo does desexualise nakedness and does not in the least lead to public sex. So the two are not even connected let alone hinged. It is only in the mind fixated by the taboo that they are connected. One disadvantage of this is that it leads to body shame or modesty you prefer, to such a degree that people will not go to the doctor about 'intimate problems'. That may be a price worth paying for whatever the advantages are.

Doctors and nurses of course already have a desexualised attitude to nakedness, by and large, as distinct from and opposed to those who like to 'play doctors and nurses'.

What is wrong with the taboo against public nudity? Why must it hinge upon proof that it violates the taboo against public sex is my question? — Hanover

Is there something wrong with it? I can make no sense of your second question. you brought up the question of public sex, and I have no idea why. My claim is that the taboo on nudity sexualises nakedness. you may think that is a bad thing, or a good thing. As far as I can tell talk of having sex in public is a red herring of your own, and it smells extremely fishy, when you want me to explain it.

Mine is a reductio argument, not a strawman, asking why change one and not the other unless you can show how in principle they're not the same. — Hanover

But who argued for a change? Where is the argument to reduce to absurdity?

That is apart from the conflation of nudity and sex, of course which is exactly the effect of the taboo on nudity that I have been pointing out. And of course the evidence of the Naturist movement is that it is perfectly possible to dispense with the taboo on nudity without dispensing with the taboo on public sex. But don't let the evidence undermine your straw man.

You've identified that public nakedness is taboo and argued it is without justification. — Hanover

I have not said anything about justification; I have said it has a function in patriarchal society. I have not made any suggestion about what changes ought to be made.

Beyond that, I pointed to another taboo, which is that we don't have sex openly in public, — Hanover

Yes, was that supposed to be significant of something?

That is, we needn't place all these taboos on the agenda to consider them for change and dramatically restructure our social norms just because we now face challenges from a very small minority as to what a man or woman is. — Hanover

Oh yes, it signifies that we have to change all our taboos if we even question one of them, and I am advocating that.

And you have the gall to accuse me of snark, along with your strawmannirg.

Yes. So one is always two selves. — Ludwig V

Thought produces that conflict whenever it turns inward. So the tradition of meditation is to be aware of the flow of thought without further comment or judgement until the flow ceases. Thus the Zen koan is unanswerable, so as to block the road of thinking: "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" When the flow of thought ceases, the conflict of the self that is not itself ends.

And then it starts again because there is always another thought, like this ... until one has one's 'every minute zen', at which point, if anyone asks you about the sound of one hand clapping , you give them a hearty slap or some such.

Anyway, I'm about out of borrowed wisdom on this topic, so I'll bow out here, but feel free to continue, and thanks for your contributions.

No sane person would defend an act of rape. — Tzeentch

And yet one in four women has been sexually assaulted or raped in the UK. That's a great deal of insanity, wouldn't you say?

Attributing these things to some sort of unspoken deal by men to oppress women frankly sounds insane to me. — Tzeentch

And that's even more insanity. One is indoctrinated into one's society from birth, and perhaps begins to question it in adolescence. One refers to this in polite society as "the social contract", not "some sort of unspoken deal". One learns what a man is and what a woman is and what insanity is. And that is what this thread is supposed to be questioning, that requires folk to become aware of, and question, their own social conditioning rather than trying to impose it uncritically on the topic.

Clearly, what I am saying is controversial on this site. And clearly it would not be remotely controversial on the Rape Crisis site I linked to above. So perhaps, unless you all want to say that all feminists are insane, you could be a tad more circumspect in your language. And perhaps a look at that site might make some of what I have been saying a bit more intelligible to people here.
https://rapecrisis.org.uk/get-informed/about-sexual-violence/what-is-rape-culture/

We are supposed to be discussing what a matriarchy would be, and how it would differ from current society. This is difficult because it is far removed from the history and traditions, most particularly the philosophical traditions of the West, as witnessed by the notoriously sexist reputation of philosophy departments. It requires a mind that has already been shaken out of its default assumptions. So I should not be as surprised as I am at the attitudes here. I'm going to leave this thread here, but no doubt the topic will come up again.

If you like utopian/distopian science fiction, you might like to read Seven Days in New Crete by Robert Graves.

Try a dictionary.

"Taboo" I'd submit is the dysphemism for "community standard." — Hanover

Yes indeed. I have community standards, you have quaint customs, they have primitive taboos.

Fer fuck's sake! Has no one on this site read any sociology or anthropology?

Criminals have a function in society. The criminal is created by the law, and the legal system is created by the criminal. There is a thief, because there is private property. And then there are locks and locksmiths and police and judges and prison officers and so on. If there were no criminals all that facet of society would be useless and fall away, so the thief is a necessary and integral part of the whole system. If the system is so effective that theft is eliminated, the system becomes redundant and is cut back until theft becomes a viable option again. Thus the thief functions to support the police and justice system and the security industry in a symbiotic relationship.

This just how things work, a kind of game theory, not a moral theory.

In the same way, one can look at the effect the rapist has as their function, and that is to instil fear in women, that 'encourages' them towards monogamy and domesticity. And the effect on men? "Nothing to do with me mate. They ought to be locked up, end of."
In other words, the rapist functions to support and maintain patriarchy. I don't think I can make it much clearer without becoming boringly repetitive. And it's bed time for old men.

However, I still don't see the correlation with rape. — Spencer Thurgood

It is not the case that rape is condoned, any more than it is the case that robbery is condoned by purveyors of security alarm systems. Nevertheless rape functions, just as robbery functions to instil fear and thereby sell alarms. No conspiracy or even approval is required.

I fail to see how a system influenced at least in part by a need to prove father ship in a society without the benefit of genetics, leads to "rape culture".

Could you elaborate on what connect the two ideas together? — Spencer Thurgood

Sure.

How does patriarchal society control the sexual behaviour of women? It takes some fairly strong measures, because sexual activity is a natural and enjoyable pastime. Since we live in a patriarchal society, one has only to look at what those features are that restrict women in the relevant ways.

Religion is a big factor, obviously, and property laws and employment restrictions used to maintain the dependence of women on men. These have all receded in recent times because of some movement towards equality. There was a further liberation of women with the invention of the contraceptive pill, and if one were to add economic independence and generous child support and childcare facilities, and of course available abortion, we could have come close to equality an equality of the sexes. But fear of rape has increased.


Rape is a serious crime, but it is not seriously dealt with by enforcement agencies or the justice system. On the contrary, reporting a rape is discouraged by making the investigation process as unpleasant and humiliating as possible, and the very rare prosecution even more so. The blaming of the victim that occurs in rape cases is unparalleled in any other criminal case. The woman that drinks, or flirts, or dresses appropriately for a night out, or has a history of having sex, or flirting or dressing appropriately, or wears too much make up or, stays out after the coach has turned back into a pumpkin, — is asking for it. Not merely consenting, asking for it.

When we talk about ‘rape culture’, we’re talking about a society where sexual violence and abuse is normalised, played down and laughed off. And where women and girls are seen as ‘less than’ men and boys.

https://rapecrisis.org.uk/get-informed/about-sexual-violence/what-is-rape-culture/

Plenty of detail and statistics there too, and the connection to patriarchy is also made. All I have done is make the connection explicit. The tendency is to identify social structure with explicit rules, but unwritten practices are what reveal the actual state of society, not the pious wishes of politicians and the like.

Having said that, there are big, beautiful bright red glistening strawberries that sell well, and then there are the pale, smallish sometimes mis-shaped ones I grow that actually taste like strawberries. This is the result of commercial breeding to produce stuff that sells on appearance and shelf life, so perhaps conservatives are on to something, and market researchers are uncovering paradoxes of their own creation.

If it doesn't enhance my status, who gives a toss? It'a all about me or else it's no concern of mine.

If we look at the sense of touch, instead of the sense of sight, the possible negative effects of clothing on arousal are very evident. Consider Hanover\s example of squeezing into the shower, skin on skin, as compared to squeezing into an elevator, cloths on cloths. It's very evident that cloths can have a very negative effect on the sensual stimulus which provides the potential for arousal. — Metaphysician Undercover

That is true also, but irrelevant to the effect of the taboo. On the contrary, the effect of a norm of nakedness would be to make overcrowding unacceptable for just those reasons you suggest, unless close contact was also desexualised as occurs to a great extent in 'touchy-feely' communities.

And that would be a miracle!