A poster, reading 'Destroy Patriarchy, Not The Planet'. Photo: By Markus Spiske on Unsplash.
Original spin: Damian Entwistle says patriarchy must be resisted
‘This is not happenstance. This is sponsored.’
The doctrine of original sin is commonly held in mainstream Christianity. And I think Friends too can recognise that humans do not always exercise their free will in ways that build one another up, or honour that dignity to which we are called as ‘children of God’. I would like us to consider a new way of looking at all this, and propose an idea of what original sin might actually be: patriarchy.
Patriarchy infers that it is men, uniquely, who ought to exercise control, power and dominance. It carries the notion that men are the ones with agency; that women find their place by respecting this God-given status, and that their fulfilment lies in being dutiful daughters, wives, and mothers. This is not a flight of fancy: calls for the repeal of the nineteenth amendment to the US Constitution (women’s voting rights) are being voiced by the religious right in the USA even as I type. They say women’s voices can be heard via their fathers, brothers, and husbands.
If we begin at the beginning, with Genesis, we note that the first words attributed to Adam are unambiguously proprietorial with respect to the woman: ‘This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called Woman for out of Man this one was taken’ (Gen 2:23). His very next words are those blaming Eve for the fact that he ignored the express command of God (given to him before Eve even existed). Thus the chorus of the ages was first heard in Eden. At the very outset of the human story, woman is first appropriated by man, then scapegoated by him.
In 2022, I went to see the Feminine Power exhibition at the British Museum, which caused a sifting. High up on the wall, defying gravity, was Lilith, naked, but meeting the male gaze with scorn, absolutely refusing to be objectified. Thus I became acquainted with the fact that, according to a Jewish mythological tradition, Lilith, and not Eve, was the first woman. Refusing to subordinate herself to Adam, she absconded from Eden.
In 2023, after some initial scepticism, but on the recommendation of my joyfully feisty great-niece, I went to see the Barbie movie. Aimee said its humour would appeal, and its dissection of patriarchy would resonate. She was right. In vibrant pinks, with a thumpingly good soundtrack, it railed against the political, social and institutional structures and relationships whereby women are controlled, marginalised, and oppressed.
In our society, it seems always to have been men who (citing Biblical precedent) determined the boundaries and qualities expected of women in their allocated roles: care-giving, family, nurture, gentleness, meekness, subordination. As with any control mechanism, patriarchy is at its most powerful when it passes unrecognised, and therefore unquestioned. When it is insidious. When it is camouflaged.
And yet there have always been courageous naysayers (and yay-sayers) who have called out the power structures they were (meant to be) subject to. Scripture offers examples. Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus points us towards five women, all of whom are striking individuals, none bearing the imprimatur of traditional virtue or patriarchal approval. If the names Matthew places before us do not shock us, it is because we are paying insufficient attention. The counter-cultural stories (and faith journeys) of Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba, and Mary merit close attention; each became an instrument of salvation.
‘Patriarchy and misogyny are akin to the dogs of war.’
Patriarchy has always relied, for its potency, on a very particular realisation of masculinity, before which all must kneel. To maintain its hegemony, it suppresses other narratives and other possibilities. Patriarchy calls forth a host of regressive control mechanisms, and we are surrounded by its institutionalised power structures: misogyny, racism, heteronormative and cisgendered jaundice, plutocracy, and ableism. Male power at the centre, surrounded by fortifications.
History attests that women have been pushing back against patriarchy since Eve was expelled from Eden. But for our part, men have been seeking to frustrate the agency of women, and that of their intersectional allies, for equally long.
The obverse of patriarchy’s coin states than women must not exercise agency, independence, or power (Barbie notwithstanding). The reverse is also true: there is no scope for men to be nurturing, caregivers, tender in parenting, to be gentle, to be in-gatherers. The recent US presidential election was alive with such absurdities: ‘electing Kamala Harris as president will result in the feminisation of men’. Unsurprisingly, running alongside this nonsense is a shrill misogyny. Patriarchy and misogyny are akin to the dogs of war, Phobos and Deimos, always together, answering to violence, betraying their maleficence.
So here we are, in 2025, still living in the dystopian landscape of patriarchy. We must topple it. Masculinity must be reconceived.
Since patriarchy is bonded to misogyny, it absolutely cannot relinquish its sex and gender norms and hope to survive. The more our narratives become pluriform, the more we attend to (previously) stifled voices, the greater the variety of experience which is reverenced, the greater the threat to patriarchy. Naturally, the greater the threat, the more urgent and violent the response –physical, psychological, judicial, emotional. Patriarchy stokes culture wars, purposefully.
I note with personal distress the increase in violent crimes directed at the LGBTQ+ community, both here and abroad. In the United States, over the course of the past decade, 335 transgender persons have been murdered. The UK statistics are also horrific. While in 2013/14 there were 4,622 sexual orientation hate crimes, in 2023/24 there were 22,839. This is an almost five-fold increase. This is not happenstance. This is sponsored.
Friends, patriarchy is insidious, pervasive, and (increasingly) desperate. I believe we must extirpate it to regain ‘the glorious liberty of the children of God’. To revisit Genesis, where we began: this is a tree we need to uproot.
The fruit is poisoned, and we must stop eating it.
Comments
The story of Adam and Eve is such a strange one. The Spare Rib is a reversal of reality - men come out of women (through birth) not the other way round. Although not all women give birth it is only women who are able to and it is the male “need” to control women’s fertility that is the root of patriarchy.
Patriarchy is insidious, as you say. In my experience the latest form is to tell women that being female is a matter of gender identity, not sex. Disagreement with this view is a “sin” committed by women who won’t submit to men/ orthodoxy.
By RebeccaVaughan on 2nd January 2025 - 18:45
Any person identified as male at birth who is willing to give up on any possibility of patriarchal privilege and subject themselves to abuse and discrimination in order to express in the world something they experience as deeply real about themselves i.e. that they are women should be welcomed by all who are willing to see the Light in people who don’t quite conform to patriarchal norms.
By katemackrell on 4th January 2025 - 18:04
Please login to add a comment
