The Meaning of Patriarchy
March 8, 2011
JOSIAH writes:
Patriarchy is assumed by many to mean rule by men. Feminists make this assumption, and anti-feminists tend to make this mistaken assumption too. Patriarchy is not rule by men, but rule by patriarchs (from the Latin root pater) or family men. In the past, most men were patriarchs so patriarch and man were interchangeable. This is the reason we have made the mistaken assumption that patriachy is rule by men.
Since patriarchy is rule by family men, you can’t have patriarchy without families. It’s more accurate to think of patriarchy as rule by the male heads of families. In manner of speaking patriarchy is rule by families since it makes family the basic element of society. Since patriarchs are the heads of families they effectively become the rulers of society. That’s why it’s called patriarchy and not “familyarchy.”
Understanding patriarchy in this manner is important because there are two parts of anti-feminism. There are those who want patriarchy and those who want masculinism (the mens rights guys). Those who want patriarchy want to put the family back in its proper place in society. The masculinists want to destroy the family as much as the feminists do, perhaps even more so. As we oppose feminism we have to be careful not to support the masculinists because they would just make things worse. For instance, you have said that jobs should go to men first. This is true but it should be said more accurately that jobs should go to patriarchs or family men first. Otherwise the masculinists would take the jobs but use family salaries for their own hedonism leaving women and children out in the cold.
Masculinists are just single men who don’t want to take responsibility for women and children. Patriarchs take responsiblity for the continuation of society.
Laura writes:
Pericles in his famous funeral oration said:
… for never can a fair or just policy be expected of the citizen who does not, like his fellows, bring to the decision the interests and apprehensions of a father.
Fatherhood is interested judgment and protection, standing between the individual and overweening control by the state and the marketplace. We have given up the authority of fathers for indiffferent rule by bureaucratic and commercial forces. Fatherhood has been sentimentalized, cheapened and outright abused.
Bonald at the Throne and Altar has a good description of the patriarchal family with its hierarchical order. He writes:
In order to function as a unit, the family must have a center of authority. At first appearance, it would seem that the mother is the natural center of authority. Her primary job is nurture, while the father’s primary job is defense, and it is obvious that defense exists for the purpose of nurture, and not vice versa. Since ends should always dictate means, one would conclude that the wife should command the husband. However, all known societies have reached the opposite conclusion, that the husband should rule. The reason lies in the ways that mother and father symbolize authority. The father has a particular duty to represent the objective, transcendent moral law, and the authority of this law overrides every other consideration, even the good of each family member or of all put together. Therefore, the father holds ultimate authority.
There is a reason economic discrimination traditionally was practiced in favor of men in general, not just married men. Every man is potentially a father. Also, unmarried men often served a paternal role in their extended families.
— Comments —
Joe Long writes:
Laura writes,
Fatherhood is interested judgment and protection, standing between the individual and overweening control by the state and the marketplace…”
Indeed. Patriarchy – the rule of fathers – could also be considered simply the rule of the grown-ups. The so-called men’s movement aims for perpetual adolescence, while the feminist interpretion of matriarchy is often downright infantilizing and galumps merrily towards the “custodial state” which intends to nurture us all to death.
The one who both is a grown-up, and actively perpetuates grown-up-ness, is the “paterfamilias.”
Bruce writes:
