Simon Paynton

Unseen wrote:

why can’t we accept it as simply natural? And if it is natural, why challenge or oppose it? And if society is unnatural, how can that be?

Everything to do with humans can be considered natural, as in created by humans.  I think you’re committing the naturalistic fallacy – that anything “natural” is somehow “good” or even “a…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

if society isn’t a person how can it form intent? Or is it a person in some abstruse philosophical sense?

It’s not a living thing, but is made up of living things – people, who have agency and intent and instincts and psychology.

Women are oppressed in almost every society.  One theory of social norms says that:

• every large gr…

[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

Your view, as with so much of “woke” feminism, implies that un-woke women are just not as smart as woke women, otherwise they’d be woke, right? I mean, apparently men and woke women “get it” more than un-woke women do. Because…?

You’re imputing a view to me that I don’t hold.  I happen to think that a lot of woke people are daft as…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

in which they are full participants

That’s the nature of social norms: they apply to everyone, and everyone tends to buy into them.  Patriarchy is a set of social norms aimed at the oppression of women (among some probable benefits for women and children, such as male chivalry).

After all, as I’m informed by a very “woke”…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

I looked at the date on the article you referred me to, and it seems to be a product of days gone by 50 years ago), at a time when Ms. Magazine had burst on the scene

Karen Lampell Endicott is an ethnographer and an anthropologist: a scientist.  As such, she’s there to report the facts as she finds them.  As am I.  Neither of us is…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

Simon, what is a “non-materialistic society”?

The kind of society without permanent possessions apart from the bare minimum, without agriculture, and nomadic.

Unseen wrote:

In prehistory (cave man days), it was my impression that mating was more like what we today would call rape, not romance. How egalitarian was that?

It seems lik…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

Most or, really, all matriarchal societies are primitive. I wonder why.

Karen Lampell Endicott, writing in 1981, said that “simple” (i.e., nomadic, non-materialistic) societies (of which there aren’t many left) are egalitarian in general, and have egalitarianism between the sexes.  She also says that as soon as power structures…[Read more]

I think there are big differences due to socialisation, and relatively small fundamental differences.

I don’t know, there has to be a reason why there are mainly patriarchies and almost no matriarchies, and it’s not necessarily to do with “success”.  Endicott (1981) says that males take advantage of power structures in society to impose their dominance over females.  How this happens I’m not sure.  In egalitarian societies, the gender relations ar…[Read more]

I should add, she mentioned that she has students, whom she explains this stuff to, so I imagine she’s a university lecturer or a teacher.

I’ve been having a discussion on Facebook with, apparently, a woke feminist.  I self-identify as a feminist, and I agree in principle with most “woke” ideas.  But I often disagree with the way they carry them out.  This person is so woke she doesn’t know what day it is, although I didn’t say that, out of politeness: it’s not a good tactic to be ru…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

Introducing facts and rationality into an emotional issue in order to create a rational world, but it’s futile.

So, your side is “rational”, but the other side are stupid liars?  That’s also what they think of you.

I don’t know, I think we have to assume that each side is well meaning, and start from there.  Everyone tends to have the same motivations, unless they have “dark traits” or some kind of hidden agenda.

Unseen wrote:

Introducing facts and rationality into an emotional issue

To pro-life people, it’s a “fact” that the foetus is a human being.  To pro-choice people, more accurately in my opinion, it’s a proto-human being, not yet a human being.  However, it has rights under the law, not to be killed in an assault.  It’s one big grey area, and th…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:

You use facts to justify your position but no fact will prove your position.

What do you mean by “prove”?  The fact is, in some matters, there’s an ethical dilemma.  Each side has a good case.  But what the anti-abortion people are not stating, is that it’s also a patriarchal attempt to control women’s bodies and reproduction.  Is…[Read more]

I’m actually pro-choice.

All these attitudes are fact-driven.  It’s how people interpret the facts – what value they place on various facts – that makes the difference.