I marched in the women's march in NYC this past weekend. It was an incredible experience it gave me hope, inspiration, and most importantly a voice. It was great to see people from all different backgrounds coming together for a common goal... Equality. So with this theme of equality I made a sign about equality. On a neon pink poster board it said "Less Patriarchy More Equality" I thought the statement was simple and reasonable & I thought wouldn't hear any criticism at the Women's March but 2 men who were marching had an issue with my sign. These men were marching in solidarity with women but still were insulted by my sign. These 2 men kind of put a damper on this experience for me. The first man tapped my shoulder and told me “it should say patriarchs for equality" I responded by nodding and walking away. Then further into a march a man yelled from the distance "your sign is offensive!" Now I was just pissed. I didn't go to a march to promote equality to be criticized by a man. Why is being against patriarchy offensive?
So I decided to look up the exact definition of patriarchy. "Social organization marked by the supremacy of the father in the clan or family, the legal dependence of wives and children, and the reckoning of descent and inheritance in the male line; broadly: control by men of a disproportionately large share of power. “
A patriarchal society is NOT an equal society it pretty much says it in the definition. I being against that does not make me a man hater. It makes me a decent human being. I believe people truly do not understand the meanings of patriarchy & matriarchy so it causes confusion. I believe a society works better when both women & men are in charge. I'll admit, I almost made the sign say "less patriarchy more matriarchy" but then I thought that might be offensive because I shouldn't say women are better than men but equal to them. That was one of the main reasons I marched yesterday. Women are not treated equally to men in societies around the world (including ours). We have a major power imbalance and it needs to become balanced. The women's march was an amazing, inspirational, and historic event and it should not be derailed by the common misconception of feminist hating men. That being said I'm going to leave you all with this.. We should all be feminists.
