“kyriarchy, the system identified by Harvard theologian Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza, which explains how ethnicity, class, economics and education, as well as gender, intersect to oppress us all, men as well as women.”
“Where patriarchy – literally, rule of the father – explains only how traditional male authority dictates to, and subjugates women, kyriarchy (from the Greek: kyrios – lord/master; archion – dominion/rule) relates how each of us, whatever our gender, is a bundle of privileges we can all too readily abuse by invoking the “master power”, whether that’s as a black female barrister, a mixed-race trans male teacher, or a white immigrant male labourer. At the same time, the term’s connotations of elite authority perfectly tap into the legacy of oppression that western feminists, from Mary Wollstonecraft to Germaine Greer, have dedicatedly derided.”
“Take porn for example. Patriarchy just isn’t useful when we want to talk about how its proliferation is negatively impacting on men and women alike. Kyriarchy, by contrast, accounts for the increasing numbers of men who are suffering from sexual performance anxiety or emotional disconnection with women, which can be related to x-rated overconsumption, and how female performers, who can make good money out of being the object of both male and female desire and envy, can argue they are somewhat empowered by doing so. This isn’t to claim porn stars as emancipated feminist role models; it’s just to recognise that sexual allure and money, rightly or wrongly, accord power that oppresses too.”
“It helps us to recognise the interconnection of education, class and eating disorders such as anorexia, and of domestic violence and poverty, rather than encouraging us to indiscriminately blame men. It contextualises the contempt of working-class male unionists towards Margaret Thatcher. It helps to explain how women themselves can in some cases morph into the supremacist bully, when paranoid mothers pass on anxieties about food and bodies to their daughters, ground down themselves by years of trying to live up to constructed notions of beauty.”