The Toxic Effects of Patriarchy in Society
Patriarchy, broadly defined as ‘control by men of a disproportionately large share of power’ by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, is a negative force found everywhere. It is in the catcalls that chase women down streets, in the suppressed tears of men attempting to ‘man up’ in difficult times, in the pain and misery of those in the closet––just to name a few. Misogyny, toxic masculinity and homophobia all stem from the patriarchy, while various social systems are also developed based on a patriarchal structure. Men are considered ‘superior’ to women; more deserving, more worthy, more intelligent despite this being entirely unjustified. Women are expected to be submissive and inferior, their only purpose to bear children and continue their male spouse’s lineage. And for centuries, these sexist concepts have been blindly accepted––that is, up until feminism came into motion.
To understand patriarchy and its impact on our everyday lives, one must first understand feminism. It has a lengthy history and is generally divided into four ‘waves’, which will be briefly explained. First-wave feminism began in the late 1800s and went on into the early 1900s in the UK and the US. It was mainly centred on women’s suffrage: the simple right to vote in political elections. Well-known suffragists from the period include Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Stanton, who sought to educate the public on the importance of gender equality and are widely considered the first feminists in Western history. In the 1960s, the second wave raged through the United States and quickly spread to the rest of the Western world. It covered issues caused by patriarchy, like the ‘housewife’ role in the household, reproductive rights and workplace inequalities, amongst others. It put marital rape and domestic violence under the glaring spotlight, causing some changes in the law regarding divorce and custody.
The second wave declined in the 1980s, but its spirit was rekindled yet again in the 1990s’ third-wave feminism, wherein feminists pushed for more diversity in their movement. They demanded that feminism not be limited to white, straight, middle-to-upper-class, cis-gendered women, and rather all women, regardless of race, sexuality and social class. Ultimately, this brought upon a wide variety of new terms and concepts, including intersectionality, transfeminism and sex-positivity. The fourth––and most recent––wave was started in 2012 by Laura Bates and her Everyday Sexism Project and is known for female empowerment through the internet. Highlights include the #FreeTheNipple movement, supported by the likes of Rihanna and Miley Cyrus, and the ongoing #MeToo movement, spurred on by the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment allegations. These feminist movements mainly occurred in the Western world, though much of the East had a women’s liberation movement in the mid-1900s. Nevertheless, feminism is markedly weaker in the Eastern world compared to the Western world, but with time and effort, one can hope this will change in the future.
Aside from patriarchy in society, feminism faces many other barriers––some led by women––that are retrograde to the movement, namely Social Justice Warriors (SJWs) and Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminists (TERFs). Though it depends on the context, SJWs are internet ‘activists’ that go to the extremes for the sake of ‘social justice’; for instance, they claim that disliking the 2016 Ghostbusters reboot is inherently misogynistic. Their views are unbalanced to the extent that they believe those that currently have more power and freedom, such as straight, white, cis-gendered men, ought to face terrible punishment purely because of their identity. The ‘feminism’ of TERFs excludes transgender women, meaning that they believe only cis-gendered women count as women. In a sense, the ‘freedom’ and ‘equality’ SJWs and TERFs fight for is limited to a certain group of people and are therefore not ‘freedom’ or ‘equality’ at all. Not only are SJWs’ and TERFs’ views unjust and harmful to the identities of perfectly valid people, they cause great damage to the feminist movement fighting for the freedom of all women regardless of identity.
Feminism matters because it is the first step towards disassembling patriarchy, which enables men to feel entitled to do anything and everything they wish with women. Chanel Miller, the author of the memoir Know My Name and victim of convicted sex offender Brock Turner, was subjected to years of dehumanising, publicised trials after being sexually assaulted. Unsurprisingly, the media assigned Miller the role of the ‘promiscuous woman’ rather than the ‘victim of sexual assault’, while Turner was described as the ‘Stanford University swimmer’ rather than the ‘suspected rapist’. In her memoir, she discusses the way she was asked questions at a rapid-fire speed, such as ‘what was the colour of your cardigan?’ or ‘do you have a history of cheating?’ As though such trivial, arbitrary personal information was in any way relevant to the fact that Turner had taken advantage of her on Stanford’s campus grounds. And yet some have the audacity to lay the blame solely at her feet with an unbalanced focus on her inebriated state.
In fierce retaliation, Miller wrote a victim impact statement that she read in court and published on Buzzfeed News in mid-2016. Around a week after she published it, her statement had garnered over 15 million reads. As she later put it, ‘Rape hotlines were ringing, calls and volunteers increasing.’ This is what feminism does. It is the first step towards justice, towards equality, towards freedom. The victim, thanks to patriarchy, is too often blamed first, while the perpetrator of the crime––if male––is wrongly regarded as innocent. Feminism can change that.
That said, the oppression of women forms merely a fraction of patriarchy: another equally damaging part of it is toxic masculinity. The term originated in the mythopoetic men’s movement that occurred towards the end of the 20th century in the US. It has since become somewhat controversial, but at its core, toxic masculinity is the universal ideology that men ought to adhere to their traditional gender roles. Toxic masculinity reinforces the dually incorrect and harmful concept that showing emotions, particularly pain or fear, is not ‘manly’. For men, vulnerability is frequently looked down upon and confused with weakness, a trait supposedly reserved for women or the ‘damsel in distress’. Aggression, anger and heightened sex drives are seen as masculine, while ‘feminine’ qualities like preferring the colour pink, being victims of abuse and caring for children emasculate men. Women are conquests, objects that any ‘man’ should aspire to achieve. All these factors play a key part in strengthening patriarchy through the misguided belief that men are superior.
If a boy is bullied by his peers or bullying his peers, many will shrug it off, dismiss it––‘boys will be boys’, they say. All their serious trauma is ignored and thus worsened thanks to the misconception that, as ‘men’, they should hide their tears and ‘man up’. This suppression of emotions and gradual buildup of psychological trauma can lead to gendered violence, sexual assault, severe mental health issues, loneliness, substance abuse, stress and more in adulthood. There has been a long history of male suicide rates being higher than that of females: according to BBC Future, suicide is the largest cause of death for men younger than 45. A major reason why this may be is that men are less willing than women to seek help during their most difficult times since doing so is seen as shameful and emasculating. Although toxic masculinity certainly is not the only factor that contributes to this horrific statistic, there is no doubt that it does make a significant difference in men’s overall mental health and well-being.
The LGBTQIA+ community are also victims of the patriarchy. For instance, lesbians are considered ‘unnatural’ because they have no interest whatsoever in straight men who, coincidentally, reside at the top of the patriarchy. Bisexual women are thought to be bisexual purely for the sake of a man’s pleasure, which is both false and misogynistic. Gay couples are often asked which one of them acts as the ‘mother’ or the ‘father’, implying that they should adhere to traditional heterosexual gender roles. The patriarchy only believes in two possible genders: male and female. This causes the incredibly unfair exclusion of the trans, non-binary and fluid community in society. These are only a few examples of how damaging the patriarchy can be––its negative effects are everywhere.
To dismantle the patriarchy, we need freedom for all, regardless of gender, race, sexuality and social class. We must encourage feminism. We must fight back against toxic masculinity. We must accept that people love whoever they love and are whoever they are. We must stop our incessant rejection of diversity. We must rid ourselves of prejudice and stereotypes.
It is then––and only then––that humanity as a whole can be free of the poison that is patriarchy.