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By David Futrelle
So over in the Men Going Their Own Way subreddit, some dude who doesn’t understand the basics of history or much else has declared, in all caps, that “WOMEN WERE NEVER OPPRESSED!”
He gives a slew of unoriginal alleged reasons for this conclusion that will be familiar to most long-time misogynist-watchers. I especially enjoyed this one:
There’s a lot that’s wrong here, but I thought I’d highlight one thing in particular, which is that MEN TODAY DID NOT CREATE CIVILIZATION; THEY INHERITED IT from the men (and women) of the past.
And I feel fairly certain that the sort of dude who posts crap like this on Reddit isn’t going to end up contributing much if anything to civilization over the course of his lifetime, unless Cheeto stains in the carpet count as a civilization-building achievement.
So the OP’s argument is not really that women were never oppressed, just that they deserved it.
Meier made Civilization but he also made Colonization which is hella problematic. I mean it’s a fun game and I enjoy it, but I doubt it’d be made today.
@Merlyn:
I sense a straw being clutched.
It is true that the Redditor doesn’t use the word “today” anywhere in his post. But he does use the present tense, and is saying how he thinks things should work today/in future. He suggests that women should “create [anything they need] for themselves, just like men do” (emphasis mine). His entire argument is that, here and now, men deserve the benefits of civilization and a say in how it’s run, and women should be polite / courteous if they want to join in.
@Jack Hamilton
Are you being serious right now with this shit? ‘Cause I’m cranky and sore from traveling and am absolutely up for sprinkling Legos on the side of your bed while you sleep.
I’d argue that the concept of “civilization” is feminine if not feminist, these tools don’t understand that their barbaric toxic masculinity breeds violent tribal culture, not respect and dignity for people.
Also the erasure of female work reminds me of this essay I read titled
Women as Scribes Throughout History: “Throughout the course of my studies on the history of writing, professional or otherwise, I have heard many ways to describe scribes and their lives: professional writers; sometimes mundane and uncomfortable working conditions; monks; the mastery of the stylus; educated men during the Roman Empire; the colophon… and given all of these aspects, I have never once heard them in relation to a woman.” It’s a great read, you should check it out if you like history.
I must confess that reading this while watching an episode of “How Do They Do It?” about a fedora factory has invoked a sense of irony I was not previously aware existed.
I’ve always wondered what they think the “creation of civilization” entailed, exactly, and why they assume only men were involved. What is the mental image here?
Jack Hamilton,
That’s factually incorrect and sexiat af. Care to walk it back?
Funny how these dudes say women have done nothing to create civilization, but blame us for all its ills.
Which is it to be young fella?
I don’t think you have the best reading comprehension ability. The whole point of mocking the “we hunted the mammoth for you” argument is that misogynists frequently take credit for the inventions of past men. Even if it was true that women in the past didn’t contribute to civilization at all – and it isn’t – it doesn’t follow that today’s men are all civilization builders and today’s women aren’t capable of doing anything but providing sex for men.
I can’t believe this even needs to be explained to you. You should feel bad about that.
@Jack Hamilton
I don’t think so.
Fuck, yeah!
@WWTH – fucking misogynissts and their fucjigb oven timers. Okay, better get the choc chip cookies out. Otherwise, fuck yeah!
I feel comfortable in saying that anyone who uses the term “objectively speaking” without providing any evidence for their statement doesn’t know what objectivity is. It’s just an assertion that they’re right ’cause gosh darn it look how darn smartie-smart they are!
@Jack Hamilton, I call your objectivity into question and ask you to provide sources! Reputable journals only, please.
@Merlyn, you’re right, he didn’t say that today’s men created civilization! He only said that todays’ men could decide who are allowed to participate in the civilization! Clearly a far more rational statement, and I just can’t imagine how anyone might possible have an argument aga-
-cough-
sorry, a bit of sarcasm there. Do I really need to point out how silly you’re being? You’re trying to score points instead of actually getting at the content of things. You’re playing semantics. And I should know, I study those!
Merlyn,
Read the comment policy. You violated it twice.
Also, no. Don’t piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining.
This rant and many of his others do indeed male the claim that men as a monolith (white men specifically) built all of civilization and should therefore control it. Shitheads like him have no accomplishments of their own to claim, so they claim being male means all men’s accomplishments are theirs. No one has to help Fartiste look like a fool. He does a bang up job of that all on his own.
Male = make.
Apologies.
Sorry, not Fartiste. Wrong thread.
Well, this MGTOW also doesn’t need help looking foolish, ignorant and generally shitty either.
This is giving the conceit of a garbage person far too much credit than it deserves, but can we get a working definition of “created” and “civilisation”? Because I’ve seen these two words just bandied about by asshats who obviously haven’t done a damned thing with their lives as if the rest of us will just unthinkingly swallow it and say “well of course it was all men doing everything….”
Because if “civilisation” signifies the establishment of defined and ever-more complex societies out of the hunter-gatherer nomadic tribes of the past, then you can bet your sweet bippy that women were integral to that process no matter what part of the earth you’re looking at. It’s easy to just imagine women in pure home-making care-giving roles given puritanical ideals buttressed by popular depictions in media, but when resources were scarce, particularly in barter economies, you can be damned sure they were conducting affairs critical to survival of “civilisation.”
What I suspect is that the “civilisation” this joker is referring to is the current fruits of socio-political and economic achievement, like our systems of government, social fabric, infrastructure etc. As if everything around us was just poofed into existence by stuffy old guys in powdered wigs and then we built some statues of them to remind us of our sorcerer forefathers. Nope, took a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get where we are today, and women were right there the whole time. They just didn’t get the statues.
I have two questions for the men obsessed with thinking that they are superior and responsible for civilization:
1. Why is it common knowledge that places in history such as the New World, Old American Wild West where women were few for a very long time, and present day Asia where communities mostly of men that can’t find wives because girls have been aborted are generally lawless and violent with high substance abuse that lessen considerably once women arrive?
and
2. If it’s the physical work of building infrastructure that makes men so superior and the real creators of civilization, why has that type of work been looked down on and given to slaves to do for most of human history? (By other men, may I add)
@Gussie Jives:
Vere Gordon Childe, an Australian archeologist, gives us the following ten conditions for a society to be considered a civilisation:
1. Urban settlements
2. Full-time specialists not involved in agricultural activities
3. Concentration of surplus production
4. Class structure
5. State-level organization
6. Monumental public building
7. Extensive trading networks
8. Standardized monumental artwork
9. Writing
10. Development of exact sciences
Childe is deeply problematic, but this list is (as far as I know) the gold standard of civilisation. I might be tempted to add “state monopoly on violence” to the list, but I’m not an archeologist so I’ll leave it to the professionals.
It would be very difficult to state that the early Egyptians and Mesopotamians restricted those activities to only men.
If I had to guess, they fill a room with white men, open a curtain to reveal an opinionated woman (safely behind soundproof glass), and the fedoras all just materialise out of nowhere?
Bingo. It was a surreal experience visiting Washington D.C. this past week and seeing the sprawling Capitol building and having to remember “Oh yeah, slaves built that.”
Mount Vernon was just as surreal. At least it had a dedicated memorial to its enslaved workforce and actually named them in the display material (i.e. “George Washington’s enslaved driver Joe maintained this buggy from 1783 until…). Arlington House did the same thing, not only preserving the slave quarters but they also had an entire exhibit on the lives of the enslaved staff after the end of the Civil War, namely the Gray family. It turns out that after its owners expired, the only people left who knew the property inside and out were its former slave staff, who aided the Park Service in restoring Arlington House once it fell under the jurisdiction of the National Park Service.
As a Canadian who is all-too-wary of America’s (and to a lesser extent Canada’s) habit of reveling in myth, seeing it owning up to its slave-holding past was a pleasant surprise. Because it’s just that kind of toil and hardship that really builds civilizations and none of us should forget it.
@ EJ
I would have to assume for that list to be accepted, there would have to be some leeway on number of conditions met. For instance:
Would automatically discount the Incas (who to my knowledge were unique in having a massive empire and no writing, but still), and probably most pre-Columbian American group barring the Aztecs and Mayans. For the others, I’d wonder about the definitions used.
Depends on what counts as a “state,” I’d think. I usually hear it in conjuction with the creation of modern nation-states, but I kinda recall Guns, Germs, and Steel also including it as part of the four broad levels of political organization (Band, Chiefdom, Tribe, State).
I’m equally certain that the Southerners still fighting the War for “States’ Rights” (pffft) protest the inclusion of “slaves built a lot of the early American civilization” in history. Unless it of course also mentions how the slave holders were the “leaders” of the group. Hmmmph. Ask a lot of early slave holders how to build “X”, and the answer would have been, “I tell my enslaved foreman ‘build X’.”
Ray of Rays:
The Inca had writing, more or less.
@ EJ
Oh, cool! I knew about the Quipu, but I didn’t know there was evidence they were used beyond numerical record-keeping.
“declares man who’s created nothing” — Seems like you had to insult him in order to get your point. Both men and women have their place is society, and we can both make it shine. But all modern civilization stems from patriarchy whether you like it or not.