Feminism is wrong. Men have always dominated women and its unnatural for it to be any other way.

anonymous asked:

Feminism is wrong. Men have always dominated women and its unnatural for it to be any other way

First off, it’s simply not true that men have always dominated women. The history of cultural hierarchies around the world is diverse and complex. There are many examples of societies where females maintained equal power among men. Many of the West’s current gender roles were completely reversed, or at least switched up, in various ancient communities. Women ruled as queens in ancient Egypt and among Bedouins in pre-Islamic Arabia; women were emperors as often as men in ancient Japan; adult women could own property, serve as clergy, and participate in trade in Sumer and Mesopotamia; the list goes on. The current dearth of female equality is not due to ‘natural’ circumstance, it’s due to a long and complex trend toward patriarchal values. This trend occurred for a variety of reasons, not the least of which was the rise of subsistence agriculture, the commodification of women’s reproductive labor, and the spread of increasingly patriarchal religious and political ideology. As far as what was ‘natural’ in pre-civilization, we simply don’t know for sure. There’s some evidence that pre-history nomadic life was quite egalitarian, with women and men both playing large roles in everything from hunting to child rearing, but we can’t be absolutely sure. That’s why it’s called ‘pre-history’. All we have to work with is archeological evidence that we try to reverse engineer and then slap on our best ad hoc explanations. What we can put our money on, though, is that life was highly diverse. There was almost certainly no ‘standard’ gender roles in pre-historical humans, as there were a huge amount of groups and tribes and most of them were culturally isolated for generations on end.

Secondly, there’s a bigger problem with your assumptions aside from the historical inaccuracies. Namely, that you assume 'natural’ to be 'good’. In the world of philosophy this is called the Appeal to Nature Fallacy, and it’s a big no-no. You can’t equate what’s 'natural’ with what’s 'good’ because there are lots and lots of 'natural’ things that are extremely bad.* Like, bad as in deadly and cruel and merciless and nasty and brutal and other nightmarish Hobbesian adjectives. Cyanide is natural, for instance (assuming your definition of natural is something that exists outside of or hasn’t been manipulated by humans. It’s important to note, too, that there is a lot of controversy over what we can even mean when we say 'natural’, since, you know, humans are part of nature too, but we’ll just go ahead and stick with this definition since it seems to be what most people are thinking when they say it), and cancer is natural, and all sorts of nasty bacteria, and tooth decay, and boogers, and oozing pus, and prairie-doggin’ dingleberries. From worms that burrow into eyeballs, to fungi that turn insects into cannibalistic zombies, to wasp larvae that devour creatures from the inside out, to cats and orcas that play with and torture their living prey for hours on end, to rampant infanticide in almost every recorded animal species—the natural world is, to a huge a extent, fucking awful and terrifying. If you need more examples, go ahead and watch some David Attenborough documentaries—there exist no better vivid illustrations of both the majesty and the horror of the natural world (other than, of course, actually living it).

So to say that women should be a certain way because it’s 'natural’ is not only sexist, but it’s to say nothing meaningful whatsoever. It’s nonsense. Who cares what our lives were 'naturally’ like, particularly in regard to our moral and social behavior? Evolution shaped us, and it’s a blind and brutal process with no foresight, no regard for our long-term well-being. We’re extremely lucky to possess the faculties that we do, including our intellect, our moral sense, and our ability to love and care so deeply. But we have also been endowed with deeply ingrained cognitive biases, limiting and parochial tribalistic intuitions that cause us to favor those who are similar to us and disdain those who are different, and a host of other unsavory and confining traits. It is up to us not to wallow in our 'natures’, but to challenge ourselves to improve. Let us not cage the better angels of our nature; let us instead, through collective and thoughtful consideration, expand them and let them be free.

*There are also lots of 'unnatural’ things that are good. Like vaccines, and hospitals, and soap, and dogs, and writing and reading, and corrective lenses, and astrophotography, and pizza, and life-size Carl Sagan pillows. The Appeal to Nature fallacy goes both ways, which is why I always cringe a little when I hear people arguing that homosexuality is good because it’s natural. Whether or not our sexuality is natural is beside the point. What matters is if it’s harmful in some way. No, homosexuality is not good because it’s natural. It’s good because it’s harmless, because it’s a perfectly healthy expression of love and affection, because it has zero negative consequences whatsoever and ignorant and bigoted opposition to it only causes suffering.