PING!
Posted on 02/24/2007 4:18:12 PM PST by GMMAC
Patriarchy ended in 1965
George Jonas, National Post
Published: Saturday, February 24, 2007
There's an old Jewish prayer:
"Thank you, Lord, for not making me a woman." My father used to continue it by saying "because then I'd have to lie between silk sheets until noon, instead of being able to stagger out of bed at the crack of dawn to open up the butcher shop."
I'm not sure what made Father pick butcher shops at dawn to symbolize masculine duties -- he was a musician in his youth, a private banker in his prime and was never near a butcher shop except (on rare occasions) as a customer. He did, however, put his finger on the central point my mother once expressed as "I don't mind being equal to men as long as I don't have to give up being superior to them."
Mother was born in the Edwardian era. By then, a European lady would find the ancient Jewish prayer quaint. In 20th-century Europe a middleclass- plus woman had most of a man's privileges without most of his duties. What was there not to like? "Well, people stare at me when I drive," my aunt offered. "As well they should, in self-defence," my father would say after she was out of earshot. My mother's younger sister was an enthusiastic, if somewhat erratic, pioneer of women's automotive independence.
All this was a full generation before the first feminists burned their bras in New York's Central Park in the 1960s, which itself happened more than a generation ago. A baby born on the day the first bra went up in smoke is about 42 today. This year, I suggest, is the year 42 ME, or Matriarchal Era, into which we leapt in 1965 from the Patriarchal Era that preceded it. (If you're asking about EE, the Era of Equality, forget it. We flew over it, barely touching it with our toes.) Anyway, should such a 42-year-old say thanks today for not being (a) a woman (if he isn't) or (b) a man (if she isn't)?
The answer, I respectfully suggest, depends on his/her nature.
As the anthropologist Margaret Mead observed, human societies come in various forms, but it would be a mistake to think that an aggressive tribe has a preponderance of war-like people, and a pacific tribe is filled with milquetoasts. No: both tribes may have a similar distribution of assertive and mild-mannered individuals; it's only that in an aggressive society a pugnacious person will seem well adjusted, while an easygoing chap will be a better fit in a pacific society.
The same is true of feminine and masculine traits, as these terms are traditionally understood. God distributes estrogen and testosterone as unequally as wealth. The first doesn't necessarily abound in women, and neither does the second in men. Male estrogenites and testosteronic females should greet the demise of patriarchy with tears of joy and grunts of satisfaction, respectively.
Did you dream of operating heavy machinery as a little girl? Or of playing with dolls as a little boy? Thank your lucky stars you were born in 1965 or later. Were your dreams as a little boy or girl -- well, more traditional? Were they what my mother would have called, ahem, normal? OK; brace yourself for a few jolts as a person born in the Matriarchal Era.
Where do I fit in? I'm a lyric poet who races motorcycles (well, used to, anyway.) I straddle the hormonal divide. I'm lucky.
Lucky individuals are born in societies that suit and reward their nature. Others, born in the wrong period or place, will spend more time on the couch of their favourite Freudian. Or -- given the scarcity of Polynesian psychiatrists -- hand over more piglets to the medicine man to put a curse on their neighbours.
Mead was making her observations in the South Sea Islands around the same time as my aunt was trying to accustom the inhabitants of Central Europe to the sight of woman drivers. My aunt's nature was different from my mother's, even though they were sisters, showing that you can share both genes and upbringing with someone without sharing much else. My mother, much as she may have disliked living in Saudi Arabia for other reasons, would have been quite comfortable with that country's reluctance to let women drive. "But why would they want to, dear?" she would have asked, in genuine bewilderment.
Key question. A woman has a better chance of sitting on the Supreme Court in the Second Gulf War era than she did during the Second World War -- but why would she want to? Self-evident to some; a puzzle to others. A woman also has a better chance of sitting in a wheelchair. Second World War produced far more U.S. casualties than GWII, but fewer female double amputees. "Why would she want to?" She wouldn't, I suppose, but there's no free lunch.
Which brings us back to who among those born in 1965 or later should give thanks to the Lord for not making him or her a woman or a man, as the case may be. On my list there are only two. 1. Homely, ill-favoured men. If they were women, it would be worse. 2. Women five feet or under. If they were men, it would be worse. Certain things never change.
© National Post 2007
PING!
ahahaah - 1967, but proud of my "automotive independence". Too funny!
What a wonderful read! Mr. Jonas sounds like he had a very interesting childhood, and he was a lucky boy to have such parents!
I'm glad I am a woman, and I am also glad I have more choices in life than did women who went before me.
That said, our current matriarchy has given us "doves" in Congress, pregnant teenagers, fatherless gang members and the welfare state.
I'll take the patriarchy, thank you very much.
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