Posted: Dec 26, 2012 11:39 am
advaitya wrote:This is where I speculate. Patriarchy established itself only at a certain time in our long history. It's probable that we had periods prior to such a patriarchal society when men didn't have that privileged role in the community.
I'm not convinced by that. "Patriarchy" is a notoriously loosely used and loosely defined word, but it seems to be ultimately based on the superior physical strength of men, allowing them to make women do what they're told, both individually and in terms of society as a whole. Since that imbalance of physical strength has, as far as we know, always existed, there is no reason to believe that the expressions of force (such as rape) arising from it have ever not existed.
And I'm not aware of any historical evidence of "pre-patriarchal" societies. There was some speculation about this by people like Robert Graves a long time ago, but AFAIK it's all been debunked historically.