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| Reversing Societal Development | |
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| Topic Started: Apr 30 2012, 12:48 AM (421 Views) | |
| macgobhain | Apr 30 2012, 12:48 AM Post #1 |
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In thinking up the cultures for Eurydice I've been trying to come up with as many reversals of the norm as possible for cultural practices/behaviors/values there. One of the things I had thought of was the idea that the dominant societies there evolved from matriarchal and matrilocal horticulturalists rather than the patriarchal, patrilocal pastoralists that most of our world's dominant societies evolved from. This would mean that revolutions for the equalization of gender rights would be reversed: instead of women's rights movements, you would have men's rights movements. I was wondering if anyone had had similar ideas in the past maybe? I've been combing through forums and I mostly see very generalized explanations of speculative societies (other than the Speculative Psychology Competition). |
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| dialforthedevil | Apr 30 2012, 01:15 AM Post #2 |
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Frumentarii Administrator
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A society where homosexuality is common place? Where hetrosexuality is only necessary for propogating the species, perhaps only meeting at certain times. |
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| macgobhain | Apr 30 2012, 03:58 AM Post #3 |
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And... this topic is not getting very many replies. Do I have to get more specific or are dialforthedevil and I just going to have this conversation between the two of us? |
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| trex841 | Apr 30 2012, 05:16 AM Post #4 |
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um...society where clothes are not commonly worn? |
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F.I.N.D.R Field Incident Logs A comprehensive list of all organisms, artifacts, and alternative worlds encountered by the foundation team. At the present time, concepts within are inconsistent and ever shifting. (And this is just the spec related stuff) | |
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| Holben | Apr 30 2012, 06:47 AM Post #5 |
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Rumbo a la Victoria
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If you make people feel guilty about not adding replies, people will tend to make posts which don't help. How about a species that, like termites, started off as agricultural and then became hunter/gatherer? |
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Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea. "It is the old wound my king. It has never healed." | |
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| Russwallac | Apr 30 2012, 07:44 AM Post #6 |
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"Ta-da!"
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Well, in all probability, most non-human societies would be matriarchal. In the vast majority of species (aside from mammals), the females are far larger and more dominant than the males. If you want some ideas for the sort of society you're describing, go read the Neanderthal Parallax series; it's almost identical to the one you're talking about. |
"We've started a cult about a guy's liver, of course we're going to demand that you give us an incredibly scientific zombie apocalypse." -Nanotyranus
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| T.Neo | Apr 30 2012, 08:11 AM Post #7 |
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Translunar injection: TLI
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The only reason the liberation of men from gender inequality never got a 'rights movement' is because while pretty much everyone wants to be macho and wear practical clothing and have the chance to work as anything other than a teacher, nurse or secretary, men weren't that wild about embracing their 'feminine side' and abandoning a societal superiority. Things are slowly improving though. |
| A hard mathematical figure provides a sort of enlightenment to one's understanding of an idea that is never matched by mere guesswork. | |
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| trex841 | Apr 30 2012, 01:47 PM Post #8 |
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Sorry if my post sounded stupid, I though we were talking about other HUMAN societies. For other species, I have one, but I’m planning on using it, so I’m cautious about posting it. |
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F.I.N.D.R Field Incident Logs A comprehensive list of all organisms, artifacts, and alternative worlds encountered by the foundation team. At the present time, concepts within are inconsistent and ever shifting. (And this is just the spec related stuff) | |
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| macgobhain | Apr 30 2012, 02:15 PM Post #9 |
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Ha trex we were but other sapients are ok too... T.Neo, the idea for the society I was talking about is that it originated with values something like the Naiar in India. Women are viewed as the intellectual class and because it's an a world where magic exists it is believed that they are the only people who can use it (which is of course wrong). So in contrast to the intellectual females you have males who are viewed as sort of an expendable class of warriors who do the hard work and go to war. Because of the social expectations of men as defenders of the society you don't go and live at dad's house because dad could be dead before you're even born. Only in times of war do men have any kind of control over the groups decision making, when the war chief takes over. A societal shift happens as the civilization urbanizes and enters a period of war in which men decide that they don't want to give up the position of control that they hold, and the family system slowly remodels itself. So instead of children living in extended female families with no male figure in their life (boys would go off to live at the men's house by a certain age), men actually start living with women to take part in early child rearing. However the actual father of children does not raise his children, but instead the mother's closest male relative (her brother, her father) stays and helps. Men for a long period of time have no say in their children's upbringings because children are still considered to be linked to their mothers and he helps in the upbringing of his sister/daughter's children rather than his own. The "men's rights movements" that I was referring to would be a movement far later in the society for the rights of men to hold intellectual positions still dominated by women and for their right to take part in the rearing of their own children. Women would combat the argument with traditional values that men are stupid, and unable to handle deep thought, and also that men have no right to their children because they didn't carry the child in their belly for 9 months. A eusocial society turned hunter gatherer is a very interesting idea, Holbenilord... |
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| colddigger | Apr 30 2012, 02:55 PM Post #10 |
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Joke's over! Love, Parasky
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Wait, patriarchal whatsits being common among animals? I assume you mean among mammals mostly, which only makes sense when you consider gamete ratios and childcare roles of the two sexes. |
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