Sexual Politics
The conversation down there is getting good. All we need is some red wine and cheese ;)
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Although there is no biological reason why the two central functions of the family (socialisation and reproduction) need be inseparable from or even take place within it, revolutionary or utopian efforts to remove these functions from the family have been so frustrated, so beset by difficulties, that most experiments so far have involved a gradual return to tradition. This is strong evidence of how basic a form patriarchy is within all societies, and of how pervasive its effects upon family members. It is perhaps also an admonition that change undertaken without a thorough understanding of the sociopolitical institution to be changed is hardly productive. And yet radical social change cannot take place without having an effect upon patriarchy. And not simply because it is the political form which subordinates such a large percentage of the population (women and youth) but because it serves as a citadel of property and traditional interests. Marriages are financial alliances, and each household operates as an economic entity much like a corporation. As one student of the family states it, “the family is the keystone of the stratification system, the social mechanism by which it is maintained.”
-Kate Millet, Theory of Sexual Politics, 1969
Oh my, voyaging into 1970s radical feminism, Ernesto! Kate Millett’s memoirs, Flying and Sita, are worth reading. Amazing writing, incredibly redolent of its time. I’ve linked to your earlier post. Sheila Jeffrey’s name, which I hadn’t heard for many years, brought back powerful memories of my turbulent youth in the women’s movement.
Hi, Jean. Well, I think it’s still relevant in many ways. I am quoting the date as well, because that historical context and situation are important. Things have changed, and yet…
Oh I do too. Much has changed, and so very much hasn’t, or only for the worse!
E, I have no desire to take on Millett, or 1969, ah I remember it well, and my own consciousness-raising sessions in front of the stern faces of (actual organization name) The Radical Sisterhood, for which in fact I will ever be grateful, but I want to ask a question because of your “and yet …”:
If reproduction and socialization were “separated” from “the family” why would “the family” exist?
I don’t think patriarchy is relevant here. However “the family” is structured, even if it were to become coterminous with (let’s dream …) a no-longer-patriarchal society at large, the family would still be loci of reproduction, at least. And since humans are so slow to mature, at least some socialization would be inevitable.
Thus, there can be no abolition of the family.
Agreed, but families can be transformed. There are already millions of families that are not “patriarchal” in a negative sense, and married couples -of course- that are doing things differently. I don’t think the point is “abolishing” the family, but of transforming it so it does not subdue any of its members or takes active part in the “stratification system”. It seems to me traditional marriage in some supposedly secular Western societies remains one of the major ways in which negative racial, social and economic discrimination keeps being consolidated.
The only real authority I have to discuss the subject is that I’m planning to get pregnant sooner or later. But I thought I could at least contribute a small bit to this friendly conversation.
I don’t think I would proceed as some feminists do by getting pregnant on my own and dismisse the possibility of a father for my child looking after him, being good friends with him/her, teaching him/her how to be a man or a woman, how to love, how to hate from a masculine approach. I know there are some other masculine figures the child could get this from, but this are always additional: psychology has told us that even in absence (or because of it) the basic father figure is irreplaceable.
There must be some other approach to this re-enacarnation of the family that doesn’t mean denying all what’s good of it.
I think this is a large issue that needs to be ‘attacked’ simultaneously from different disciplines: there’s feminism, politics, economics, sociology, psychology…but I think we should also include poetry.
Why is it that society (in general I mean) has never aknowledge poetry as something that can provide some more light about human condition?
Maybe there’s something we’re failing to see through academic lenses. (I’m talking about what happens to me when I hear feminism, politcs, economics dissect and fail terribly when trying to explain human desire).
I wish I knew so much about poetry as you Ernesto. I don’t, but I know there are some answers there (or some better questions). Of all people, I thing you’re the one who might find some great ones.
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This is not an attempt to oversimplify the issue:
we all know there’s something rotten in Denmark when we read in the news about there being a boom in adolescent, unplanned pregnancies in the so-called information age. Feminism, family structure, the media, economics, religion, we all have failed to provide some common sense to this girls.
So why don’t we try some wild approach?
Just a tought.
They may not mean to, but they do…
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(Gracias, Ira). ;)
Ernesto–
I’m not arguing that the patriarchal family is the same as “the family”, in fact I agree with everything everyone here says, I’m just saying that Millett’s “there is no biological reason why the two central functions of the family (socialisation and reproduction) need be inseparable from or even take place within it” makes no sense.
Eltaza-
I think we can and do ask poets to be cognizant of all the issues you raise, but I don’t think we can ask them to solve them – not even Ernesto! My own belief is that the socioeconomic system we live under, which isn’t going away soon, is the major determinant of the shape of the family, not the other way round. Until we can change the system, the family will tend to coalesce in shapes similar to the western nuclear family. Of course there are exceptions – why do you think I’m so ashamed to be from California after the passage of our homophobic man-woman only marriage initiative, and glad I’m not from Georgia after their passage of the no-gay-adoption law? – but I do think the shape of the family is “superstructure” to use an old term.
I wish you all happiness in your pregnancy and parenthood, whenever it happens, and hope for you that your child or children has as many people around to love and model for it as possible.