patriarchy

“A braid is so significant to us as Lakota people because in our culture, women are the next best thing to God. And the reason why we understand that and believe in that way is because I’ve never seen a male of any species give birth. Only the females.

They have a great gift. And that is to give life.

And so we wear our hair in two separate

Here is how the Esperanza Project put it:

“[Maslow] estimated that “80–90% of the Blackfoot tribe had a quality of self-esteem that was only found in 5–10% of his own population.”

“...he did not see the quest for dominance in Blackfoot society. Instead, he discovered astounding levels of cooperation, minimal inequality, restorative justice, full

Community is the opposite of patriarchy. It does not make you earn belonging through your attractiveness or caretaking. It does not isolate women into romantic dependency. It does not parade the isolated islands of nuclear families as the pinnacle of achievement and success.

There have been women rulers. There have been groups of women in powerful positions. There have been matrilineal societies where ancestry and property is traced through the mother’s line. There have been matrifocal societies where women are the heads of households. There have been matrilocal societies where the husband moves into the wife’s

Patriarchy = “a political-social system where men dominate over women; endowed with the right to rule in government, business, religion, relationships, marriage and family life.”

Here’s how Eisler puts it:

"For millennia men have fought wars and the Blade has been a male symbol. But this does not mean men are inevitably violent and warlike. Throughout recorded history there have been peaceful and nonviolent men. Moreover, obviously there were both men and women in the prehistoric societies where the power to give and