Max Dancona, I hope when you write your article you will include a lot of citations, and not just your unsupported impression about how things are in certain indigenous cultures. I honestly don't know why I'm bothering here since you seem to be remarkably unswayed by data, expertise, and research, but here it is for perhaps someone else who might stumble across this thread.
"When Europeans first landed in the Americas they generally found economically and politically egalitarian Indian nations and communities. Wealth and political power were generally distributed among a coalition of local political and economic units in the form of villages, clans, lineages or the like. There was considerable local political independence and local control over economic assets."
"Precontact Native Americans lived in kinship societies, and extended family groups formed their communities. The extended family, made up of blood and nonblood relatives had at its core the nuclear family. The nuclear family consisted of a woman, her husband, and their children. Many tribes practiced polygamy, in which a man had two or more wives, while other tribes were monogamous. Both men and women initiated divorce, which was common and not considered immoral. (Not part of a patriarchal culture - emphasis mine)
Many tribes from the Northeast, Southeast, and Southwest were matrilineal or matrilocal. In these tribes, married couples lived near the wife's family, the mother was the center of the family, and her children received their identity from her family. Additionally, a wife was an equal to her husband and his family, not a dependent. Other tribal groups, such as the tribes of the Great Plains, were patrilineal and patrilocal. In them, the father was the center of the family, and the newly married couple moved near the husband's family and descent was passed through the family line.
In addition to the kinship systems, tribes have informal and formal methods of organizing the community and ensuring conformity. For example, among the Crow Indians, there exists the idea of "teasing cousins." Teasing cousins could ridicule other teasing cousins into proper behavior. The teasing, often conducted in public, resulted in the person being teased adopting the proper behavior and humility. The Navajos, as well as other tribal groups, have a similar relationship system that is to control behavior. (Hmm, does this sound familiar? Like just exactly what I described about aspects of egalitarianism as practiced by hunter-gatherers today)
Another way to achieve order was through a division of labor based on gender and ensuring that tasks essential to the well-being of the tribe were accomplished. Each tribe had its own system of assigning roles to women and men - a system that was based on the tribe's beliefs and the cultural values. While division of labor by gender was well defined, the divisions could be crossed; that is males might perform female tasks and vice versa without the individual's being labeled "deviant." (This too is entirely consistent with most foragers, where although strict gender roles exist, nobody pays much attention to them - the complete polar oppositite from a patriarchy, which is obsessed with binary gender deliniations).
Given the notion of interdependence, it is not surprising that many precontact societies were egalitarian. Although groups maintained a division of labor by gender, they had economic, political, and social freedom for both men and women. The sexes remained different but equal, and female and male roles complemented each other. Each role was seen as important and necessary for the survival and enrichment of the community. Women's and men's roles were thought of and institutionalized as parallel rather than hierarchical (a mark of distinction from dominance hierarchies - emphasis mine). In the egalitarian native societies, authority was dispersed and decisions would be made by those who were carrying them out. People contributed according to their ability and interest."
Native American Cultures: Family Life, Kinship and Gender
Again, this is kind of Anthropology 101 for anyone who knows even the bare basics about Native American cultures. They were overwhelmingly egalitarian - according to the anthropological notion of what that means.
"While sex was a part of traditional Native American marriage, marriage was not about sex. Prior to marriage, young people were expected to engage in sexual activities. Sex was not confined to marriage. One of the things that upset many of the early Christian missionaries was the fact that Indian women were allowed to express their sexuality and to choose their own sexual partners." Once again indicating egalitarian and not patriarchal cultures.
Traditional Native American cultures tended to be egalitarian: all people were equal. This is one of the things that bothered many of the early Christian Missionaries, particularly the Jesuits in New France, as they viewed marriage as a relationship in which the woman subjugated herself to the man. In Indian marriages, men and women were equals.
For many writers, one of the most confusing parts of Indian marriage was plural marriage. While most writers call this polygamy they are really referring to polygyny: that is, the marriage of a man to more than one woman at a time. To understand American Indian polygyny, we must begin with an understanding that marriage was an economic institution and that polygyny has to be understood in economic terms. It was not about sex.
To understand polyandry, it must be understood that most Indian societies were egalitarian and that women were not owned by men. Thus, a woman could choose to be married to two or more men. In some instances, the second husband would be the younger brother of her first husband. In many tribes, the younger brother would live with his older brother and sexually share his older brother’s wife as he matured into adulthood.
I don't know what the bee in your bonnet is about polygamy and child marriage (but it feels kind of icky), but this is not nearly as widespread or prevalent as you seem to want to believe - particularly in Native American indigenous communities. It also doesn’t have the patriarchal implications that you seem to want to cleave to. Women had a huge amount of power to choose and then divorce any partners that did not suit them and this was widespread. Many cultures were matrilineal and/or matrilocal. The Iroquois Confederacy highly influenced the formation of the American idealogy about egalitarianism.
Upon greater reflection, you seem to want to justify patriarchal configurations under the auspices of the fact that they were natural to indigenous cultures and so we shouldn't judge them (at last the truth comes out). Meanwhile, most indigenous cultures did not subscribe to patriarchal/hierarchical norms. Even Australian aboriginals are typically described as egalitarian, despite being more combative than typical forager groups. More about them in a separate message.
I'm starting to make sense of your nonsense here, and that helps me to move on. But ew, dude - your preoccupation with female subjugation is just creepy. Ick!
