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Comment by redml | Hacker News Reader

Using the word "Patriarchy" unironically gives away the fact you don't care about mens problems, because you're automatically blaming men for these problems.

You live in an age of abundance now, but 50 or so years ago you might be singing a different tune, and you can't reprogram society overnight without causing serious harm.

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You fail to grasp one crucial distinction - patriarchy is not a term that labels all men. It is a system. The crimes of patriarchy are not automatically the fault of all men. It is perfectly possible to be a man and against patriarchy (you're speaking with one right now, actually).

As for "reprogramming society" - that's just spreading FUD. Society is not a piece of stone, it changes constantly. And far from it that any of these changes happen simply overnight.

And to simply assume that patriarchy is the direct cause of our society's abundance today, well... to say the least, you may need to provide some proof :D

The word is easy to misunderstand. I usually just avoid it entirely and discuss the symptoms instead. Most people agree that what patriarchy is is something that needs changing, so it's silly to stick with a word that so reliably muddies what should be an uncontroversial conversation.

Well, it should not be easy to misunderstand an attack on patriarchy as an attack on all men. That misunderstanding makes no sense, unless a person has certain rhetorical goals...

Generally, your approach is smart, but topics like this have to stir up emotion. I believe it is completely impossible to have a meaningful discussion about such topics, which affect people's lives, without getting emotional. I guess only people who are completely unaffected by the problem at hand can have the luxury of objective distance...

Much of the time, I can say "that thing you just agreed with is the feminist position on patriarchy," and it's like a lightbulb goes off in their head. People get ideas about words and concepts because their early exposure to them was negative. Give them a more accurate concept, then reintroduce the term.

It's really no different from how people assume the fem- in feminism means it's all about putting women ahead of men. I avoid calling myself feminist for the same reason I don't generally use the word patriarchy. Avoiding confusing terms in early conversations is a simple matter of effective communication.

Are you really saying "all of society's problems exist because men run everything" whilst also saying "all of society's accomplishments are despite men running everything"?

I don't mean to put words into your mouth but that is how your statements read to me.

OK, having read more of this discussion, I don't think that's what you're saying. But what do you mean by patriarchy? What do you mean by its crimes?

My point has nothing to do with the specifics, I was merely pointing out that attacking patriarchy is not an attack against all men. That should be pretty obvious, but hey...

I don't know if I can give you a quality definition of patriarchy, I am sure you can google that yourself, if you are actually interested. If you just want me to make some silly semantic mistake and then bicker about it, then this will get boring soon...

I would say in short that patriarchy is a form of societal organization where men dominate. As the bloody word says itself already.

I'm not trying to attack you, I'm just trying to make sure we're using the word in the same way, because I couldn't attribute anything to a patriarchy in the way you do. I can't unpick the workings of society in that way. In a society where women stay at home and manage the household, they are the community builders, a business leader's first counsellor is his wife, and so on. Women are still a huge part of society. So the decisions of men could well be the decisions of women.

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