Now that we have a better understanding of patriarchy and matriarchy, what is your ideal societal structure? - ecoTrain Question of the Week
The German Anarchist "Bible"
When General Westmoreland, commander of the US troops in Vietnam, threatened to bomb the Vietcong back to stone-age, he had no idea that, if he was actually able to do so, he might do them a favor.
Archaeology has shown that life in some stone-age settlements was not exactly The Flintstones.
Excavations in Catal Hüyük, Turkey provide evidence of a neolithical society which was prosperous, without state and government but egalitarian, without poor and rich but with wealth for everybody, no social distinction and discrimination based on gender; and suddenly the term stone-age communism doesn´t sound so unattractive any more! 😘
While the original excavator, James Mellaart, became kind of infatuated with the idea of a matriarchy in Catal Hüyük, claiming that finds of female figurines representing the Mother Goddess were proof of his theory, scientists recently dispelled that as a myth and claimed that Catal Hüyük was a truely egalitarian society on all levels, no social classes, no clerics, no gender discrimination, no rulers, no ruled.
Of course Heide Göttner-Abendroth, the grand old lady of matriarchy research, became also involved in this clash of scientific egos, and she and her tribe started to create an “alternative scientific community“.
But beyond all ideas and ideologies, biases and agendas, it looks like those guys and gals in Catal Hüyük had a great life!
And they definitely didn´t give a damn about all those -isms pestering modern man.
They were caring for and nurturing each other, they were healthy (the average life expectancy of a serf in 18th century Germany was less than in Catal Hüyük about 9000 years ago, take that progress!).
About half of their waking time was used for fun and play, music and arts, something the average rat race Westerner can only dream about. Weird anatomical transformations of femurs indicate that they were fans of excessive dancing! Sounds very Kurdish to me! 😘
Also very telling is what archaeologists did not find.
No indication for and depiction of violence, torture, ritual sacrifice of humans and/or animals, typical for all other statist societies, divided in rulers and ruled.
No evidence of violent deaths of humans caused by other humans, only evidence of lethal hunting accidents (yes, animals in those days were still able to defend themselves against humans, the game wasn´t rigged yet in total favour of humans).
Apparently this was a society free of fear and repression. In the twelve layers of excavation no weapons of war were found, there is no indication that this society was ever involved in a war during those 1200 years.
So it sounds like the Garden of Eden was in Catal Hüyük, paradise on earth.
No matriarchy, no patriarchy, the only archy is anarchy! 😎
So anarchy is my ideal societal structure.
An egalitarian society, not without rules but without rulers.
More and more people start to understand that it is morally, ethically and philosophically wrong to submit under a ruling entity in whatever form, king, dictator, democracy, political correctness, whatever; and to rule by force over any amount of people in any kind of social setup like relationship, family, clan, society etc.
A society based on abundance not scarcity, on celebration of life and the power of creation not some religious adoration of death and suffering, without dominion of human over human and human over nature.
The idea that apparently humanity has spent the greater part of its history in exactly those condititions in "paradise", that only the last 6000 years were spent in "hell", appeals to me very much and gives me confidence that humanity could be capable to create paradise again.
Now this won´t be stone age paradise, it will be much better, because we have the internet, blockchain and steemit now, we can connect with whomever we want all over the globe, we are not geographically limited to a physical group next to us, we can interact instantaneously with anybody.
The Tiny Dot by Larken Rose
One of my favorite videos, explaining the utter weirdness of the ruling paradigm
The question is, how do we get there?
Sometimes I think, we´re running out of time and the evil in this world is just too powerful.
Just look at Rojava and the very real possibilty that, once again in history, a revolutionary social experiment will be crushed by the tyranny of evil men.
Then I see all those wonderful initiatives all over the globe, people starting to "dig it“, developing more and more of the required shift of consciousness, shift of paradigm, and I get optimistic again.
Well, nobody knows the future, which is more than a simple extrapolation of the known development from past to present, we might be in for some cosmic surprise there, but whatever happens, at least we have tried to make the world a better place.
In celebration of Mama Anarchija, since in all languages, beside that genderless English (how can you guys even have proper gender discussions? 😘), anarchy is feminine!
Love it @likedeeler; found this enjoyable and true! Resteemed 😘
Cheers Gwenini! 😘
I could handle spending half of my day for fun, music and art! I try to aim toward that and sometimes it happens.
Yes, the best and only archy should be anarchy.
The only archy is anarchy, love it!!
Some food for thought.
I don't always agree with your ideas or ideals but I like to ponder new perspectives.
Wow this is so nice... Keep it up
I love that you were able to find that there was a past society that has all the markings of a paradise. That gives me more hope!
Oh wow! I love the research in this piece and your anarchy idea is a little similar to what I had in my mind for my post, but I'm also a bit confused because after reading all the brilliant posts on the topic, I think a bit of everything- matriarchy, anarchy, clan system is what I want in a society.
That´s why I read the other posts only after I have written my own.
Ultimately the people who live in a societal structure have to decide what they want.
As German anarchist Horst Stowasser once said: "If then some people would decide that they want to live under a king, real anarchists would have to let them do that."
Hmm interesting. I did write my answer finally!! phew
Really nice @likedeeler, I would happily be part of your future, sounds good to me.
https://steemit.com/peace/@michaelweddle/three-northern-southern-hemispheric-governments-let-s-change-economies-of-world