Zealous Toward Social Harmony

Does the modern father still exercise patriarchal qualities in the household?

March 30, 2011 at 12:12 am Leave a comment

In today’s society, women are not seen as equals in traditional American households.  I believe that the father, as the patriarch, has the “final say” in most financial or moral decisions in the family.  One of the primary reasons that I believe a father holds a majority of the power is because he has historically been the breadwinner.  The husband typically makes the most money in a household due to pay inequality between men and women in the workplace.  It is said that more women are attending college in recent years, but they are still earning just 75 percent of what a man makes, while they perform the same job, according to an article by Msnbc (“American Women Gain in School, Lag at Work;” 3/1/11).  I think the imbalance in the workplace has caused fathers to oppress their wives, as Beauvoir suggests; “It is this economic oppression that gives rise to the social oppression to which she is subjected” (Beauvoir 55).  Not only do women face economic oppression, but their husband enforces his patriarchal power socially as well and I think this still exists today.   

This social oppression that women suffer from even happens in my own family, to an extent.  My father makes a certain percentage more than my mother, as he always has since they have been together.  As the breadwinner, my father has certain patriarchal qualities.  He has made financial decisions for the family, for example he decides where and how long the family goes on vacation.  In addition, my father has dictated our Sunday family dinners in a way that serve his own desires.  He usually determines the menu and dinner time, but he does offer to help prepare the food.  Meanwhile my mother tends to be subjected to him in a way that allows him to use his authority.  I think my mother agrees to cater to my dad’s every need and want because she believes that he works much harder at his job.  She may believe that he deserves better treatment because he works longer hours and performs more strenuous labor.  Beauvoir writes that in some cases a woman can become part of a master-slave relationship with a man; “In organized patriarchal society the slave was only a beast of burden with a human face; the master exercised tyrannical authority, which exalted his pride—and he turned against women” (Beauvoir 78).  I don’t think that my mother is under this type of oppression, but if she married my father in a different era, the relationship may be different.
   

When the book, the Second Sex, was published by Beauvoir in the 1950s, patriarchs ruled the household.  According to the Msnbc article, in 1948, only 32 percent of women participated in the labor force in the United States.  Therefore, men not only dominated the workforce, but they could dictate the marriage at home.  In many cases, the wife was expected to stay at home and care for the children, as well as perform other household tasks.  Also it is known that women were seen as mainly “reproductive tools” back then.  But the lack of women in the workplace caused a lack of liberation for a wife.  “The fundamental fact that from the beginning of history doomed woman to domestic work and prevented her taking part in the shaping of the world was her enslavement to the generative function” (Beauvoir 117).  Women did not have the right to make decisions in the household, let alone to make decisions in society.  
   

So I conclude that although women have been given more opportunities in the workplace today, they are still not regarded as equal members in the household.  Thus, this society is still rooted in a patriarchal system.  However, I do believe that the economic and social oppression that husbands have over their wives is to a lesser extent of what it once was like in the 1950s.  In the future I would predict that women would gain equal benefits in the workplace, but it remains to be seen whether they will be treated as equals in the household due to a long history of a patriarchal society.

Works Cited:

Beauvoir, Simone De, Constance Borde, and Sheila Malovany-Chevallier. The Second Sex. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1989. Print.

Zengerle, Patricia. “American Women Gain in School, Lag at Work – Health – Msnbc.com.” Y, Local, US & World News – Msnbc.com. 1 Mar. 2011. Web. <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41854465/>.

Entry filed under: Sexism, Social Conflict. Tags: breadwinner, feminism, feminists, gender equality, patriarch, Sexism, Simone De Beauvoir, the Second Sex.