Maybe You Are in the Patriarchy

What we can’t see

The strangest thing about living under dominance and hierarchy is that we don’t see it.

As with LGBTQ+ people, we do not know what others experience, and we are prejudicial to feelings unfamiliar to us. This intolerance is also aided by our sexism.

For example, when I was a little girl, I did not know that the little boys, or members of my own family and neighborhood, had vastly different experiences than mine. We generally do not know how we are programmed because we are socially compliant on autopilot.

I had no idea that when the principal at my kindergarten school “slut-shamed” me by making me kneel in the hall and using a ruler to measure my legs. He was trying to assess if my dress was too short. I only remember the humiliation. I did not see sexism.

Unseen sexism went on for some years. I remember a boy behind me in class, kicking my chair. He was muttering and repeating: “scabby c-word”. It did not occur to me until I was thirty that he would not chant that to another boy.

When I went to Alaska as a teen, my friend Jen and I were taken to bars, gotten drunk by much older men, stripped, and assaulted. Aqua vitae. I had never even heard of it. I will never know entirely what occurred. I was not there mentally. It was my first alcohol and Jen and I were blacked out. To this day, I am certain I feel much shame (victim blaming) but that the perpetrators do not ever, even think of it.

Through my twenties, the constant coercion to have sex continued. I honestly did not know that my non-consent made them rapists. I am quite certain most men making out with their dates do not realize it.

So far, I have only made references to sexuality. But, in religion, governance, careers, housework, body shaming, childcare, healthcare, and so many other overlapping spheres, there is more sexism than any of us could ever realize.

Segregation and integration

Discrimination against women is worldwide.

What you may have realized is this: we talk a great deal about racism, which is truly a formidable enemy we must confront. But, our partnerships, co-workers, governing, religion, capitalism, climate chaos, and community interactions require us to not confront sexism in the same way. Our need to get along and “not make waves” is a result of our social programming.

I am a woman with privilege and even a tiny voice (you are reading it, thanks!), but if I am called a “Karen”, it is truly hurtful. It is sexist and racist. We more often hear the racist part of those two halves because the sexist half is more invisible.

In most human societies, sexism has been the norm for so long that we internalize it whole. With race, there was a clear intent of segregation. With sex, we not only integrate, but more often than not, we love and live with the “dominating” men who run religion, government, careers, and economic society. We often don’t see that domination of the planet — global heating — is also sexist in origin.

Patriarchy is a social structure, not a man versus woman thing. Of course, women participate in making sexism happen. We would never get it done without women’s contribution and strength! Who defeated the ERA, and who still preaches that a woman’s body or life choices should be restricted to “traditional” roles? It is mostly women who are on the front lines, although most of the final lawmakers are male.

The worry of words, and Johns

We even have public shaming of the very word “feminism.” We are more comfortable in asserting we are anti-racist than in saying we are anti-sexist. Never mind that billions of people are both in color, and are female.

It is easy for a racist to say “I am not a racist.” It is rarer to hear, “I am a feminist.” The very word has come to mean some sort of hatred for the very men we hope to liberate from the man box, through feminism. The entire point of feminism, always, was about having equality of freedom and autonomy in all spheres.

Words carry power. That is why every election cycle, we get sick to death of them. On every side, there is propaganda, misinformation, and outright lying. There are too many misleading words. We naturally are social and avoid conflict personally. Are you woke or anti-woke? Canceled or censored? Inflation, or climate conflagration? You are told to choose sides. It’s exhausting. We all just want to get along, so we go along with our social programs.

This is why we avoid confronting sexism; all of us must get along with men and women because that is who we are.

Even sex work is dominated by the idea of the “whore” more so than the rather neutral “John.” If you are just recently realizing that there is a “male gaze” in Hollywood or Bollywood, it may make you feel uncomfortable. Most cast members in entertainment industries have been overwhelmingly male until this century. Until quite recently, there were more CEOs named John than there were women (of any name) running corporations.
There is a global imbalance in power structures, monotheism, policing, corporations, sports, (even the playfield or skate park near you!), and government. You probably already know that the Dalai Lama, Pope, and Mullahs are not female.

This kind of non-representation is very baked-in, and problematic.

If you have an automatic defense mechanism when hearing about it, then, welcome to being human. We all have emotions and neurochemistry in our bodies that translate into our attitudes about any “ism”. And our sexism is one of the most programed, involuntary, internalized, and ancient attitudes that we all share.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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