Do you think there is still a patriarchy in modern western society?

Not really. Go outside of western society and then yes there is.

As @ARE_you_kidding_me says, in contrast to other societies, it appears not. But comparisons can be misleading.

The answer is yes. Although we are advanced toward gender equality far beyond other societies, the fundamentals of paternalism still guide and affect our daily lives. Our Father, Who art in Heaven, Hallowed be thy Name, for one.

The predominant religions in the West—the Abramaic three—are based on the belief of a pretective, intolerant, omnipotent male figure which is so integrated into our history, laws, rituals, societal norms and affects this culture so deeply that even the most recalcitrant atheist is influenced by its paternalism. It cannot be otherwise.

The US, arguably the most powerful nation in the West, has just elected an intolerant, autocratic alpha male as it’s leader, by just less than 3 million votes in a contest involving 47.6 voters. Although he was not elected by the popular vote, no one can deny this man’s popularity and the wish in our society for a strong leader at a time of perceived stress. When under stress, people go for the surest thing and their true colors come out.

If it is boldness and strength one is looking for in a leader, masculinity is still the go-to model, a model with the attributes of their god. And thus, paternalism is alive and well in the West.

We still have a long way to go, but I must say, we have come a long, long way since I left high school in 1970. And yes, we a far beyond many societies I’ve lived in since.

I think any remnants that are left here are vestigial and waning to the fringes of perception. The memory of it remains and is out of phase with reality. As to Trump consider a conservative female promising the same things to a struggling working class. We would have a female president even if Trump was in the race. Hell, it could have even been Sarah Palin. The vast majority of Trump voters were not enthusiastic about it.

@Espiritus_Corvus expressed it with eloquence.
@ARE_you_kidding_me is, unfotuneately, blinded by the privilege of that very patriarchy.
To give some specific examples, in the film industry, projects produced and directed by men are much more likely (by a huge margin) to get funding for a major motion picture than projects produced and directed by women.
A small business loan for a restaurant is much more likely to be granted to a man than to a woman with a virtually identical business plan.
And so on.

It is, indeed, much less obvious and oppressive in most developed Western cultures than others, but it is still, very definitely there.

Yes, though the hegemony of men has shrunken considerably in my lifetime, traditions and habits remain persistently durable.

It is rampant in the United States, but then again, we are not a modern society.

“is, unfotuneately, blinded by the privilege of that very patriarchy.”
Really? Care to explain that?

as @ARE_you_kidding_me‘s response demonstrates, we are so used to the patriarchal social norms that dominate western society that we barely even notice they exist, to the point of denying them altogether.

Someone back it up with verifiable facts from a neutral source.

You’ve already been provided many examples here, @ARE_you_kidding_me. Need more?

Not a single one meets the above criteria. Women have the same level of rights that men do, perception is all that is left and feeding that perception of patriarchy certainly does not help.

And blacks have the same level of rights that whites do.

Wow, we solved racism! And we did it fifty years ago!

If black people perceive any racism, well, they’re just wrong.~~

By your “criteria,” there is no proof that racism exists in modern western society anymore. See the flaw in your logic yet?

We are not talking about sexism or racism. We do not live in a patriarchal system by definition, what remains of that are just muted echoes.

Patriarchy is not laws, but mindset and perspective.

If Patriarchy was just an echo, we would not have rampant legislation just in the last two weeks of men trying to regulate women and women being told by elected officials to go home and be quiet and serve the husband breakfast in bed.

@ARE_you_kidding_me You speak as a wounded man who thinks he should get back his place that has been usurped by all these uppity women.

Every morning I wake up and read that in yet another state, lawmakers are trying to take away my right to ownership over my own body.

In Oklahoma earlier this week, for example, a state representative described pregnant women as “hosts” for their fetuses.

The same state is advancing legislation right now that would require women to get permission from the fetus’s father in order to obtain an abortion, clearly demonstrating that abortion legislation has much less to do with “sanctity of life” than it has to do with controlling women’s bodies.

I don’t live in Oklahoma, but I live in a state that has similarly patronizing and restrictive abortion laws, and so do tens of millions of other women in the US.

Muted echos my fucking ass.

“If Patriarchy was just an echo, we would not have rampant legislation just in the last two weeks of men trying to regulate women and women being told by elected officials to go home and be quiet and serve the husband breakfast in bed.”

Where is this “rampant” legislation. If you’re speaking of abortion that’s got a religious/right to life basis. Outside of this what have you got to back that up with.

“You speak as a wounded man who thinks he should get back his place that has been usurped by all these uppity women.”

No, I just call out bullshit.

If it’s a “right to life” basis, then why would anyone want to require women to get permission from the baby daddy for abortion?

“No, I just call out bullshit.”

Yeah, well, you also think climate change isn’t man made, so you’ve already established that you have a hard time accepting verifiable reality.

Oh, @ARE_you_kidding_me, why do you so vehemently deny something that you don’t experience? Sexism is a big component of “patriarchy”, in fact it defines it. You would do well to observe more closely and try to learn a thing, rather than immediately and absolutely denying its existence.

Oh, and the earth is roughly spheroid.

What this reminds of is a similar debate regarding gay rights. Before the US and also Ireland legalized marriage equality, it was argued that gay people have exactly the same rights as others. Clearly at was not the case and even today it is not the case in other areas of society. But those who are not gay will still try to claim that equal rights was already in place.

The same goes for gender equality, too many people too oblivious to know if women are being discriminated, assume things are the same for them as men.

There was a study performed in the United Kingdom and that study found that men are much more likely to get promoted in the workforce than their female colleagues.

It has also been doscovered that many still have this misconception that women starting families are less ambitious.

@cinnamonk “Yeah, well, you also think climate change isn’t man made, so you’ve already established that you have a hard time accepting verifiable reality.”

No, What I think is that we don’t actually know if we are causing it or not or what magnitude of influence that we are having. People act as if it’s a totally confirmed, verified and vetted scientific fact that we are the sole cause or prime contributor of climate change. This simply is not the case.

@ARE_you_kidding_me ah, so you’ve examined the evidence and poured over the available literature about it.

anyway, this is getting off topic. But there is a great deal of analogy between your disbelief in AGW and your denial of male hegemony.

^^I have poured over quite a bit yes and you keep throwing out “disbelief” I have never said that. My stance is that we don’t really know yet. This kind of science is fascinating to me and I worked in environmental data acquisition for a long time. I totally geek out on that stuff. Temperature surveys were my living for about five years. That data was used for predictive modeling and some of it likely got integrated some climate predictions. It’s still being debated outside of politics. If I had to guess I would say that yes we are contributing but perhaps not in a measurable way yet. My opinion of what we should do makes our role in climate change moot because we would not be living the way we are. I would rather see us living a a more agrarian, sustainable and simple lifestyle. And don’t think for a second that I don’t have a problem with us doubling the CO2 and clear cutting forests. I’m vehemently against that, after all I am an environmentalist.

@Nerdy_Keith I still don’t think homosexuals enjoy equal rights for the record. I do see “male hegemony” as mostly perception at this point. Don’t confuse that with sexism. There is enough of that going both ways right now. Perception is everything and when we take discussion on it and turn up the volume I genuinely believe we make the problem worse. This is not the same as just “ignore it and it will go away” When and where it truly exists it needs to be dealt with but outside of that we are doing damage by volume, repeat and replay.
I’m with Morgan Freeman on this

@ARE_you_kidding_me discussion for another time maybe but I really wonder what you think is causing it then.

^^Climate change will happen regardless if we are pushing it or not. Source: Several billion years of historical geology.

That was never in question…

We don’t know if we are in natural variation, causing a slight influence or are greatly impacting our climate. Teasing that out is not such a simple thing. I think it was easier to get to the moon to be honest.

Oh yes. Kids still have their father’s last name. Seems like families concentrate more on the family lineage of the males.

I skimmed what was answered above me. I think in America there are still pockets of patriarchy. I say pockets, because some of it has to do with subcultures within the US. We have people from many different countries, and some of their cultural norms still hang on once they immigrate here. I see many Latin American and Arab men who want to run the family like they are in charge. Their wives from the same culture, sometimes go along with it, and sometimes once in America become more indeiendent and less tolerant of that set up than the average American woman. In no way am I suggesting that all Hispanic or Arab men have these exievtatuins, but enough do that you see it even in America. I guess you could argue though that that isn’t the “western” society you are inquiring about.

When I lived in the South many Christian couples went with that whole women are to submit to men thing.

Someone mentioned above we use “men” to mean both men and women still. That doesn’t bother me. I just saw Ashton Kutcher speaking in front of congress about human trafficking and visibly distraught talking about little girls being bought and sold and raped, and unnoticed even he during that speech used men and people interchangeably throughout the speech.

I think more and more women and men can both do any sport and any career. It’s more and more equal. I think men are still expected to always earn a living and women not always if they are married. The guy gets a pass if the couple agrees to letting him be the stay at home dad, but I don’t think men can be stay it home sans children without ridicule.

When I recenently made calling cards for my husband and I, I couldn’t decide whether to put his name first or mine. A woman next to me at the Staples store said I should put mine as a statement. It wasn’t a statement, I just want to put what looked better. I called my husband to ask if he cared and he didn’t. Twice now, since we have been giving out the cards someone has asked me why my name is first.

Maybe this will help clarify @ARE_you_kidding_me: Historically, the term patriarchy was used to refer to autocratic rule by the male head of a family. However, in modern times, it more generally refers to social systems in which power is primarily held by adult men.

I think you are focusing on the historical and not the modern version.

And from this article in The Nation: “Patriarchy is political-social system that insists that males are inherently dominating, superior to everything and everyone deemed weak, especially females, and endowed with the right to dominate and rule over the weak and to maintain that dominance through various forms of psychological terrorism and violence.”

Can you tell me that you can read that and not see the mindset of the entire present (and to be fair, most past) administration. Our society is based in a patriarchal belief system and despite improvements, continues to be one. Yes, you can compare it to other societies and on a sliding scale it may be less so, but it still is.

And earlier someone mentioned sexism which, I think you do not think is related to patriarchy but seriously,  “sexism is a consequence and symptom of a society that practices patriarchy”. from the same Nation article

Here’s a quick thought experiment.

Instead of asking “can a women do y that a man can do?” .... Because my suspicion is that most of those questions won’t feel weird when we play them out in our minds. Even if statistically there are disparities in the number of men and women out there doing y, we recognize that the statistics represent complex, multi-faceted issues. And we can spend a long time teasing apart those pieces… and then disagreeing about what weight goes to what piece…

Instead of asking “can a women do y that a man can do?”—let’s try asking the reverse question—“can a man do x that a women can do?” Because if we’re really at equal footing, these questions also won’t feel weird when we play them out in our minds.

But then we get to a question like this: Women can wear both pants and skirts without fanfare, without it being odd. Can men wear do the same? Or, in short, can a man wear skirts and dresses?

Why is it usually considered a joke, considered funny, as if the man were making less of himself by putting on a skirt?

It shouldn’t be a strange thing for a man to want the feeling of freedom and ventilation that comes from a skirt; or the ease of a one-piece outfit (i.e., a dress); or, let’s face it, the way the right skirt can be more forgiving to certain areas of the body, because it doesn’t cling. Skirts and dresses can be tremendously comfortable and convenient. I know this. I’ve worn them.

But a man in a dress won’t be taken seriously in “serious” contexts. Putting on the feminine-typed garment lowers his social status. (Conversely, putting on masculine-typed garments raises a women’s social status.) And we know this.

Continue to ask “can a man do x that a woman can do?” for similarly feminine-typed items and activities. Toys. Color preferences. Hobbies. Pick the small things, to start—they are probably easier to separate from the heat and fervor and confounding factors surrounding the larger, more complex issues. The point isn’t merely that the stereotypical man doesn’t choose something—it’s the reputation attached to him were he to choose it. The man, more often than not, seems silly, or weak, or passive, or any number of adjectives that describe, in one way or another, a lowering in social status.

Call this a small effect if you want. Say it’s just a cut of cloth. But it’s not not there, and it’s not wrong.

Contrast this with activities and items still gendered masculine—women do not lose social standing by adopting those things. They may be perceived as less “feminine,” but they are often perceived as stronger in some capacity (physical, intellectual, emotional, etc.).

There is still a patriarchal bent in western society. Acknowledging this isn’t slighting men or blaming men—which I hope is something this thought experiment, by its structure, also shows. Everyone loses when things are placed on a gendered hierarchy.

Also, just my own thinking—skirts and dresses seem to make more sense for men anyway, anatomically speaking. Pants only have compartments for two lower appendages…

Skirts have never made as much sense as pants. They get it the way so you can’t run. They swirl around and catch on fire. I never understood why society insisted on women wearing skirts and dresses in the first place.

@Dutchess_III They get it the way so you can’t run.
What about a kilt?