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This is of course the unpleasant truth. And those benefiting will tend to see it as natural or God's will.
For long - really quite seriously long - stretches of time, the larger part of any population existed in servitude. Feudalism in all its variations (slavery, serfdom, company towns) was a success because it worked.
The field hands in the antebellum South were much stronger than the soft-handed plantation owners, yet they were kept broken and subjugated not just physically, but by keeping them in ignorance of their numbers and by using religion to sugarcoat the basic injustice of their fate.
As for female subjugation, one thing that has worked against women would have been the fact that they have the kids - and that we as a species are mighty interested in sex and can get pregnant pretty much non-stop. Which means that the only way a man can be sure that his bloodline is propagated is by keeping an eye on his woman/women at all times - be it physically, or by instituting some sort of societal control.
Pregnancy does make women more vulnerable. Through pregnancy itself, childbirth, and the recovery period from childbirth.
Plus once they have children, the children's wellbeing becomes a higher priority than her own, and ensuring their immediate wellbeing would likely require meekly obeying the status quo.
Obviously your question isn't sincere but let's pretend for a minute that it is.
Most men are physically stronger than most women. So, if a man really wants to control a woman, he can simply beat her into submission. And if that woman is his wife, it's only recently that there are any consequences for it. For much of history, it has been perfectly legal for husbands to beat their wives, as seen in the 1864 case North Carolina V. Jesse Black, which reads:
A husband is responsible for the acts of his wife, and he is required to govern his household, and for that purpose the law permits him to use towards his wife such a degree of force as is necessary to control an unruly temper and make her behave herself; and unless some permanent injury be inflicted, or there be an excess of violence, or such a degree of cruelty as shows that it is inflicted to gratify his own bad passions, the law will not invade the domestic forum or go behind the curtain. It prefers to leave the parties to themselves, as the best mode of inducing them to make the matter up and live together as man and wife should.
And if you think, oh that was over a hundred years ago, let me assure you there are men reading that paragraph right now and nodding along in agreement.
Now, there was some disagreement - in Alabama (of all places!) the Supreme Court ruled in an 1871 case that:
The husband is therefore not justified or allowed by law to use such a weapon, or any other, for her moderate correction. The wife is not to be considered as the husband's slave. And the privilege, ancient though it be, to beat her with a stick, to pull her hair, choke her, spit in her face or kick her about the floor, or to inflict upon her like indignities, is not now acknowledged by our law.
So yes, you can "correct" your wife, but no weapons, choking, spitting or hair pulling. Yay progress!
But it would not be until 1976 that police departments began taking domestic violence seriously, and routinely arresting abusers. Even so, domestic violence continues to be a huge problem (yes, yes, women hit men too, but that's not what the OP asked about). Raping your wife was still legal until the early 1990's though.
Moving on from simple violence, there have historically been many ways the law has prevented women from being independent. Many of these pertained to married women - who legally ceased to exist as separate people upon marriage (example: until 1922 if a woman married a man who was not a citizen, she had to give up her own citizenship and assume that of her husband)
"Head and Master laws" were a set of property laws in America that allowed husbands to have total control over the property of his wife - even if his name was on the deed or she paid for the property. Louisiana was the last state to repeal those laws, in 1979.
Whether women could own property at all was a matter decided state by state. It started in 1848, when New York passed landmark legislation that allowed married women to own property, collect rent, file a lawsuit, receive an inheritance on her own behalf. Prior to that, a woman's property and wealth and economic existence was granted to her husband upon marriage. But it would be decades before these laws were passed in all states.
There were also laws requiring married women to turn over their income to their husbands, and laws that prevented women (married or not) from working in certain professions (the law, government work, bartending, news reporting,) or working more than a set number of hours.
Even if you could work (you were single or your husband allowed you to work) lack of access to birth control (because it was illegal even for married couples until 1965) meant women were likely to get pregnant more often than they wanted to and not when they wanted to, which makes it hard to keep a job.
Oh and even if you could work, and not get pregnant, until the late 1970s, it was legal for a bank to refuse to open an account for a woman, to allow her to apply for a credit card without a male cosigner.
So to sum up: for much of this country's history, the government maintained laws that prevented women from having economic independence. As a result, many women felt compelled to marry as a means of survival. Once married, women continued to have no legal authority to exist economically and as an added bonus, could also get raped or beaten with no repercussions.
And that, my dear, is why women - who may be personally strong and independent - have been oppressed.
And the attitudes that allowed those laws to stay in place for so long? Have not gone away.
**Forgot to add that since women couldn't vote until 1920 or serve on juries or practice law in all 50 states until the early 1970s - women could not change the laws that controlled them.
Physical strength. Might makes right. The old caveman saw of the male hitting the female over the head and dragging her by her hair into his cave.
That's how men subjugated women in the past. And they set up the social constructs to make sure women remained oppressed for centuries.
That kind of long term societal oppression is tough to break free of. But the times, they are a changing.
Nonsense!
Women reject men that have not or, even worse, refuse to ascend the male hierarchy.
Status is the name of the game and women insist that any male they hook up with have it (and the more the better).
This assures that there will always be men at the top that will **** on everyone below them, including the females that insist their man be a soulless self-involved ******* before falling in love with him and making his babies.
Men will always dominate women - not because men are physically stronger (why don't elephants or gorillas dominate over us if that's all that it takes?) but because men are more domineering, risk takers, ambitious, and clever than women. Broadly speaking.
Women were not just 2nd class citizens in one country - but pretty much every country in the world, and there are close to 200 countries in this world. And today, it's men allowing women to play "leaders". As soon as men stop, women will be forced into their century's old place. This is just reality. You can like it or hate it.
Did you venture out of your cave to type this?
Women aren't going back to the kitchen, no matter how much you long for it. And we are finished "allowing" men to decide what we can and cannot do.
This is the 21st century, NotPoliticallyCorrect. Get onboard or get left behind with the other Neanderthals who still believe it's their right to dominate and control women. Those days are over.
You will do just that if men want. Just look at what happens during say an Islamic revolution. Before - modern educated women then you're in Hijabs, being married off by your fathers and stoned to death by your brothers if you have premarital sex.
You truly enjoy everything you have now due to men. And as soon as men change their minds, you will get in line.
We are not a country ruled by the fundamentalist religions of bitter old men, much to your chagrin, I imagine. If you think Western women are going to go back to being chattel you are not going to like the 21st century much.
We always hear how women are "strong and independent". But really, if women are so strong and independent"
then why were they so easily "oppressed" ? and the like in the first place?
Quote:
Originally Posted by HeyJude514
Physical strength. Might makes right. The old caveman saw of the male hitting the female over the head and dragging her by her hair into his cave.
That's how men subjugated women in the past. And they set up the social constructs to make sure women remained oppressed for centuries.
That kind of long term societal oppression is tough to break free of. But the times, they are a changing.
Couldn't say it better myself.
It goes back even farther than that. Since the dawn of time males have dominated females in most of the creatures on Earth. If we had a massive change and 99% of all humans perished, man would dominate again. I am not saying that because it is 'right' or 'fair' but IMO.
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" why were they oppressed in the first place?
