The other day I was explaining the term fag hag to one of my friends who fit the description. I've never been friends with a gay because I've always been attracted to the friendships of heterosexual men. However I've enjoyed the friendship of several fag hags. Anyways I was at a latino gay club, had the best time ever, and I realized that outside this place these people on occasion have to take some shit and it must suck to be gay catholic culture. And then I come on here and read that in Iran:

They are executed, but there is an option -- they can go through gender reassignment surgery (have their genitals cut off) and live with their boyfriends as a "woman."

Holy shit.

> nor does it tell us anything about
> those who practice the world's
> fastest growing religion.

Amy, this is a cousin of an argument for which I often criticize you and many commenters here. Some rhetorical point will be made, something I'll regard as transparently obvious, and one of our fellow truth-mongers will pipe up and say "Oh yeah? You think so, huh? Well, then where are the studies???!?!"...

...As if some statistical evidence was required for matters of the human heart. ...As if they (or you or I) spent our lives writing down quantities of liquids in beakers while wearing white lab coats...

Or most importantly, as if there were any standard of logical argument that would satisfy them such that they wouldn't quibble about some nuance of methodology.

When small-minded people are told that contentiousness is often admirable, they assume that they'll never have to lose another argument again, and that they'll always perform a useful public service just by putting up a fight, no matter what position they take...

Which is not true.

An article in the Times of London does tell us something about Islam. Especially from that city in this year. And it's ridiculous for this person to pretend it doesn't.

(By the way, what gender is this person? Is there, within this person's underpants, a convincing mass of differentiated tissue formed towards either of the prevalent vectors? With some people it can be very hard to tell, you know. Do you suppose that doctorate in their signature betokens any kind of study you'd admire? Would they ever be permitted to use such an honorific, even deceptively, in Muslim nation?)

It's not that you're wrong about Islam, because you're not. And I know nothing about the advice column business. But it would be bad if you concentrated on the stupidity of Islam so much that you offended your general advice-seeking audience. Because then your blog would go away.

Also, Props to Gregg: The preview now shows formatted comments, which is cool.

Dear Goddess
AMEN (sorry) Once again you have hit the nail squarely on the head. It has allways been said " the truth hurts " well aparently it also riles those that are unwilling to believe it.
P.S. If you find yourself in need of a bodyguard Re: all those death threats, I am available and I'm cheap.
P.S.S. I'm also a hetrosexual male. L.O.L.

Chechnya, you say? Would that be the same Chechnya from which the Beslan murderers hailed?

Thought so.

Islam is indefensible. I really wish that people would stop trying.

Crid's point about these kinds of arguments is really spot on. Academics often take an off-balance rhetorical stance, requiring peer-reviewed study for one claim and no evidence whatsoever for another. Worse, they will often ignore plain facts in order to maintain the "truth" of those assumptions.

Unsurprisingly, the assumed claims are invariably anti-American, anti-Western, radical-feminist, post-modern, or eco-socialist.

Academics are on a mission to turn the wider society into a college campus. This is the Progressive vision in its fullest sense: tenured, unaccountable high priests "in charge" of things. It's hard for professors to achieve that goal because of contradictions with known, obvious facts. Professors must continually hide behind their assumptions in a game of logical pee-a-boo. Entire academic disciplines might topple.

Middle-eastern Studies comes immediately to mind. Peace Studies next.

Amy, don't let her get your shorts in a twist, she's in vehement denial of the real world because she can't be bothered with anything beyond her career as a college "professor". If it disturbs her mindset, it can't possibly be true. Let it go, she's not worth the time you're putting into arguing with her.

What the woman writing in ire to Amy overlooks, is that nobody is saying that there are NO good Muslims, that WOULD be foolish & bigoted.

The problem rests in that those we call "good Muslims" are the ones who IGNORE the dictates of their faith, NOT the ones who FOLLOW it.

Therein lies the difference. There are certainly killers & terrorists amongst the Christian billion, however those are the ones who IGNORE their faith, rather than follow it. They ignore the demands for turning the other cheek, tolerance, peace, etc. that are replete throughout the descriptive life of Christ that is the bulk of the New Testament.

The Islamic world, that which follows the Koran to the letters, is following dictates of violence, forced conversion, extra taxation for differing beliefs, social subservience to Muslim people, repression of speech...the horror continues.

The woman writing in argument calls those articles..."anecdotal". The problem is she doesn't get that they're NOT anecdotes...they are written Sharia law, subscribed to by some hundreds of millions of Muslims living in countries from Algeria to Indonesia, many of whom would like nothing more, than to bring that law to prominance from France to Canada to the United States itself, following rules which essentially state that there are no rules for nonMuslims.

The thing is, there are piles and piles of evidence that Islam is a great danger to all of us. Not every Muslim is dangerous, but far too many are. To say so is not "bigotry," but honesty.

I took her argument about the one Times of London article to be an intimation that it could be flawed reporting.

I replied to her and posted this because I think it's important to expose this thinking and show why it's utterly wrong.

Two pints I have to disagree in.
"There are a handful of Christians who kill abortion doctors and the like, but preachers are not up on the pulpit commanding it." While it is a very small minority there are Christian preachers calling for death ands blood.

"make up some story about a WASP who puts a baby in a microwave" It's not made up, this nut job put his baby in the microwave.

Islam like all religions is open to interpretations. Like all religious texts there are huge variations in interpretation. Other wise Sunni and Shitti Muslims would not be trying to wipe each other out. So to see Islam as a single united front is like saying Christianity or Judaism are a single unified front, they are not.

To Doc. CE: Learn to judge individuals not by the group. Your guilty of the bigotry you are accusing Amy of, though blind to it because it's (for lack of a better word) positive bigotry. Your assuming that those individuals are representative of the whole. Put simply since these Muslims are good people thus ALL Muslims are good people. The fact that you, I and most people know Muslims we both admire and respect does not change the fact that fundies are intent on our subjugation and/or extermination.

I judge by the individual and those they associate with. If someone tells me they are a fundy any fundy I'm trying to see how to get away or looking for the closest heavy object.

Now the only legit argument you might have is that those Imans shown by the media calling for Jihad of blood are actually just a tiny minority. That they are mistakenly treated as representative of the wider culture, either by the media for shock factor or due to some larger conspiracy. If this is actually true then show me some evidence that most of the mid east Islamic states doesn't want us (the west) wiped out and we'll talk.

Also using the Bosnian as an example of peaceful Muslims was an act of supreme stupidity. Why? Well look up the history of the two Bosnian SS divisions. One of them validates the beliefs of real bigots, never mind just cautious people. How evil do you have to when SS HQ in Berlin decides to disband you for Cruelty and lack of discipline?

People are people either judge by the individual or be ready to look really stupid. Every group has shit in their past that they are really really not proud of. So regardless of what slant you put on it if your judge by the group you have to take all the action of said group. In the end it all balances out to there are good people, bad people, and average people.

"The problem rests in that those we call "good Muslims" are the ones who IGNORE the dictates of their faith, NOT the ones who FOLLOW it." I had an Iman explain to me that the term Jihad means struggle not necessarily blood shed. How one chooses to interpret it is up to the individual. As far as Christians and following the dictates of their religion. Take a peek through the old testament. Killing no Israelite babies and enslaving their women are quite acceptable in fact recommended.

The comparison between the 2 faiths between the 2 nations (USA and Saudi Arabia) is groundless.

Next time when you are driving down the highway, imagine a special road for certain people who don't belong to the majority's faith? Just because you are too close to their holy cities. Lets not forget the check points to see what faith you belong too. Bilingual signs warning infidels of the consequences. Random stops by the Mutaween patrols. Local women who have to wait until you leave the aisle while shopping. Public displays of punishment: whippings, beatings, beheadings oh my. Fun, fun.

So which nation was I describing again? Oh yes, Saudi Arabia. Sometimes it does get really hard to notice the differences between the two.

What's needed is Women's Lib in Arabia. That would cure all sorts of problems. There's enough women Arabs in Arabia; all that's needed is to empower and mobilise them.

Hey, I didn't say Women's Lib in Arabia was an easy option. But it may be a path that does not involve turning the ME into glass.

Thanks Amy.

I was overseas for a while and busy with the career. It's good to be back.

Perhaps if you'd been in Oklahoma City when Tim McVeigh hit, you have thought he and all the others in his crazy, right-wing Christian club were aiming for you too.

Tim McVeigh was an aberration. We know that because Christians and Christian religious leaders roundly and loudly condemned his actions. Those who criticized McVeigh are still alive and not living in fear of being killed for condemning his actions.

Muslims and Muslim leaders have been ominously silent on suicide bombers, fatwas against Dutch cartoonists, and Theo Van Gogh. Why? Either they agree or they're afraid they'll be accused of heresy or apostasy and killed.

There are a handful of Christians who kill abortion doctors and the like, but preachers are not up on the pulpit commanding it." While it is a very small minority there are Christian preachers calling for death [and] blood

These "Christian" preachers who preach death and blood from the pulpits (unlike the imams calling for the blood of infidels to be spilled in the streets) don't preach their calls for violence openly and in public. Because most Christians view them for the lunatics they are. Their rants and calls for violence are usually limited to the Internet or to closed-door meetings of their flocks.

"don't preach their calls for violence openly and in public." Look up the Nirenberg files. They don't preach to the public in civilized areas, most of the time. In the back woods (similar to mountain caves) they do preach death and hatred. I agree the Phelps (the only name I can think of off the top of my head) is a minority but he's also a fundamentally power less minority. The Imans who preach hatred and slaughter of westerners may be a minority (I don't know this one way or the other) but they are a powerful minority.

>>> What's needed is Women's Lib in Arabia.

Thats funny Norman. Islam is a religion steeped in male insecurity and the hatred and subjugation of women. It's like an entire world religion based on what I call "LDS", (Little Dick Syndrome). I don't think thats ever going to change. I read a real good article one time about the psychology of islam and why they view and treat women the way they do. It is based on some real resentment of the female sex. I wish I could find that again. I'll look and post it if I findi it.

Mark Steyn, one of my favorite writers, once said, "There were a lot of good Germans during WWII. Damned lot of good it did us or them." It doesn't matter that there are so many good muslims when there are sooooo many radicals and the supposed majority of good muslims do not set them straight or even decry the violence. Yes, I have heard a few voices of peaceful Imams denouncing violence and terrorism, but their voices are a whisper in a windstorm.

My ears always perk up when I hear someone attaching the word fear to your point of view. The reason they do this is that we have been programmed to percieve fear as cowardice and irrationality therefore painting you as cowardly and irrational in your thinking. Remember when you were a kid and someone wanted to talk you into doing something really stupid and they would say, "Fraidy Cat, Fraidy Cat!" It's the same thing. The overuse of the suffix, phobic, is rampant in discussions about politics and social issues these days. It is usually used by the side that can't rely on common sense and facts to make their argument. Fear is like pain, it is the human sensing of a problem that needs to be addressed. It is how we respond to these alerts that can be irrational. This person, (whom I took to be a woman, I don't know why), cited anecdotes as your evidence. I think that to say the evidence of muslim brutality is limited to a few anecdotes means one of two things, this person is willfully ignorant blinding themselves to reality because it doesn't conform to their set opinion, or they are of the muslim mindset themselves and don't see it as wrong or brutal but rationalize it away as the will of Allah. It takes some real denial to knock down a thousand anecdotes in a row and stick to thinking that it is just anecdotal evidence.

Vlad makes a fair point...if I had been pointing out the old testament as a paragon of virtue. Which as he points out, it frequently is not.

And Vlad is also quite right, the word Jihad DOES mean struggle. It also, as a translated word, does not have to mean bloodshed.

However it is REPEATEDLY used in the Koran as exactly that, bloodshed, war, and violence in pursuit of Islamic dominance. Moreover, it is precisely what Muhammed practiced in building his kingdom. He waged war with regularity, and it was war that was used to resolve succession after his death.

It is true that Jihad can be of the pen, but it is undeniably that whenever it has been to the advantage of Islamic states, Jihad of the sword has been a favorite means to spread the faith.

A version of women's lib is happening in the Middle East, but slowly. To understand the Middle East you must first understand demographics. They are changing in a drastic way. So expect the region to be problematic for the next 100 years. Islamic fundamentalism is just a fear based knee jerk response by the most favored in-group (the usual suspects) to lose their 1,400 years of status. Who are the biggest recruits for these causes? Western raised Muslims who embrace fundamentalism as a temporary panacea to the underlying nihilism in modern western societies.

The biggest demographic change is Middle Eastern women gaining more access to education, work opportunities, alternative methods (internet) to express themselves and voting rights. Even Muammar al-Gaddafi of Libya understood this major social change. Snowball or sand dune effect, please take your pick. Once it starts, it won't be stopped. This will eventually lead to the breakdown of the tribal-extended family structures that compliments the Islamic culture of the region.

Change is the only constant and the Middle East is not immune to this condition. It does remind me of an old Egyptian saying: “When the Nile reaches Cairo.” The expression is much more funnier in its original Arabic.

vlad commits several errors.

While it is a very small minority there are Christian preachers calling for death ands blood. Islam like all religions is open to interpretations. Like all religious texts there are huge variations in interpretation. Other wise Sunni and Shitti Muslims would not be trying to wipe each other out. So to see Islam as a single united front is like saying Christianity or Judaism are a single unified front, they are not.

vlad’s first error is to convert a matter of degree into a matter of kind. Sure, you can find people calling for “death and blood” among atheists, scientists, geniuses, dummys, and almost any other group you can name if it’s large enough. One is foolish who guards against Christian terrorism (even fundamentalist Christians) and Islamic terrorism equally. While it is true that most Muslims are not terrorists, it is equally true that most terrorists are Muslim. Policy cannot be based on the existence of madmen in a group, but rather must account for the degree of madmen in a group and the support for madmen among the group. Islam is a much greater threat than Christianity by that measure. In fact, Christianity is hardly a threat at all by it.

vlad’s second error is to equivocate over the meaning the word ‘religion.’ Here he uses it in the Western sense, but this sense doesn’t apply to Islam. The Dar al-Islam is a theological-political-social ideology that is totalitarian in the extreme. If Islam was a religion in the Western sense, then it would be open to interpretation by its practitioners. But it isn’t. Islam is open to interpretation only to outsiders. Followers of Islam have systematically executed heretics who have attempted to “interpret” the Koran. These points are amply made in the film “What the West Need to Know about Islam” to which Amy has linked.

Learn to judge individuals not by the group…I judge by the individual and those they associate with. If someone tells me they are a fundy any fundy I'm trying to see how to get away or looking for the closest heavy object.

vlad’s third error is to disavow generalizations about human beings. On the contrary, generalizations about people are a necessity of rational policy-making. With regard to Islam, it is impossible to account for the billions of individuals that comprise the umiyya. Then we must generalize. The best generalization about Islam is that at best it is tolerant of killing kafirs, at worst it encourages killing kafirs, and always it hides and supports those that do. In general, we should fear Islam much more than any other ideological movement in the world today.

Now the only legit argument you might have is that those Imans shown by the media calling for Jihad of blood are actually just a tiny minority. That they are mistakenly treated as representative of the wider culture, either by the media for shock factor or due to some larger conspiracy.

vlad’s fourth error is to misstate the claims of others. The claim is that the Imams are indeed representative of Islam, that they are indeed representative of the beliefs of the wider Islamic culture.

If this is actually true then show me some evidence that most of the mid east Islamic states doesn't want us (the west) wiped out and we'll talk.

vlad’s fifth error is to equivocate on the terms ‘nation’ and ‘state.’ A nation is a group of people who share common customs, origins, history, and frequently language. A state is a politically organized body of people under a single government. Islam is a nation that controls some states in the world. Islam wants to take over all states, because followers of Mohammed believe that government is Islam, the state is Islam, society is Islam. Vlad’s grounds for continuing to discuss the topic are thus quite incorrect. Threats do not issue exclusively from states, but from both nations and nation-states.

All this makes Islam sound like the Borg: resistance is futile - you will be assimilated.

Warmly second Amy's welcome back to Joe!

...thought you'd been pelted to death by tomatoes in Europe:)

(God, I hope I've remembered correctly -otherwise that's gonna look very dumb!)

"All this makes Islam sound like the Borg: resistance is futile - you will be assimilated."

Islam is far from being anything close to the Borg. There are roughly 25 major tafsir (interpretations) of Islam. Most of them are written in Arabic, but the current trend is to write them in their respective native languages. A huge cultural change from the past 1,400 years. Also Islam doesn't recognize an established or centralized form of clergy, but it will acknowledges the "knowledgeable" ones (the Ulama) from among a community of believers. It's far more grassroots oriented and quite fragmented than what it appears in the media.

Jody,

Yes, I survived el tomatina 2007, but came back to a much larger mess. Career wise.

Thanks for the welcome backs and the concern. It's very much appreciated.

Joe-

The Borg comment was not entirely humorous; thanks for picking it up.

Given that the Koran seems to have been quite accurately preserved, and there is no centralised clergy, how have so many schisms arisen?

(Without a centralised clergy, how does one interpretation rather than another establish itself? Other religions rely for their existence on being taught to the young, which is the job of the clergy, so a specific viewpoint can spread, provided it can survive in competition with other conflicting viewpoints.)

Well its a popular myth that there is only one version of the Qur'an. It has long been known that variant copies of the Qur'an exist. The most famous case comes from the Sana'a fragments (7th Century) that were found in Yemen in the early 1970s. This is one of the sources where Hitchen’s bold charge of plagiarism against the Qur’an came from early Christian texts, because some of the Sana’a texts have ancient Aramaic-Syrian lines.

Holy texts just don't appear from out of the sky. All of them have histories with multiple authors and Islam is not the exception to the rule.

National Geographic - full text - http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/04/sahel/paul-salopek-text/1

A good article in total, but for my part here, referencing page 10:

Timbuktu started as a nomads’ watering hole, grew by the 16th century into the Oxford of the Islamic world (25,000 scholars once resided there), and has faded back into a geographic coma.
...
most astonishing intellectual legacy: tens of thousands of hand-lettered manuscripts, some stored in caves and household cupboards since the city’s fall to the Moroccans in 1591. There was love poetry composed in Moorish Spain. There were tracts on Islamic jurisprudence and centuries-old essays on, among other subjects, astronomy, optics, medicine, ethics, and botany. Gazing on these fragile treasures, it was hard not to lament the dearth of book learning in the Arabic-speaking world. A recent UN study found that only 10,000 books have been translated into Arabic over the past 1,200 years—barely equivalent to the number of books Spain translates every year.

Excellent post Megan.

Anyone interested in the evolution of the Qur'an. Here is an in depth article on the Sana'a fragments titled "What Is the Koran?" by Toby Lester:

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/199901/koran

Enjoy.

Gosh, reading Joe's posts it sounds like Muslims are Western-style libertarians.

Let's all sing kumbaya in friendship and peace! The Koran was composed like any other religious text.

Let's all revel in material plenty! Before al-Ghazali, Muslims had advanced learning and literature.

Let's all rejoice at moderate Islam's ascendancy! There exist commentaries on the Koran.

Islam. The first liberal political system.

F***ing hell, people.

Off your meds, Jeff?

My past contributions (here and actually living in the M.E.) would never indicate that I am an apologist for Islam. The article I posted is by a Toby Lester and was used by me to give more details on the Sana'a fragments, since the scholarship on the particular subject is quite sparse. Its called using what you got no matter what the author's personal interpretation. Fully functional adults call it depth. Try it sometimes, you might actually learn something before flying off the handle.

t

I read a real good article one time about the psychology of islam and why they view and treat women the way they do. It is based on some real resentment of the female sex. I wish I could find that again. I'll look and post it if I findi it.

The article may have been by Phyllis Chesler. See here for what might be that article:
http://76.12.0.56/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=147&Itemid=1

Or for other articles:
http://www.phyllis-chesler.com/
http://pajamasmedia.com/xpress/phyllischesler/

Religious misogyny is so widespread - at least in abrahamic religions - I wonder how it came about. After all, it looks like in late prehistory, women were revered as the creators of life. I can understand they came off this pedestal when people figured out the connection between sex and babies, but not how that turned into such repression as we have now. Anyone know about women in other religions?

"I can understand they came off this pedestal when people figured out the connection between sex and babies, but not how that turned into such repression as we have now..."

Norman,
That's a whopper of a theme - in the best possible way.

The basis for most metaphysical rationalization of female repression/protection must be women's weaker physical strength (ignoring the mighty Teri "hammer" Garr for the moment!).

(I really haven't a clue - and I do see that's an absurdly simplistic response! But it's a great question.)

I don't know about other religions, but when Roman Catholicism made its way into the British Isles, the Catholic priests sought to control the country dwellers (pagans) and to do so, discredited their wise woman (wiccans) and priestesses (healers); incorporated the pagans' superstitions and beliefs (bunnies and eggs, symbols of fertility, were incorporated from the pagans' Ostara [spring equinox] into Easter, for example); and "drove the snakes out of Ireland", which is a metaphor for driving the Druids, whose symbol of wisdom is the snake, or serpent, underground. Eradication, obviously, was not achieved, but it did scare the bejebus out of the country bumpkins. Women of power, including wealthy matrons of a lot of clans, were overthrown by the priests who siezed their power (and money) for their own. There's a great deal more in the Encyclopedia of Celtic Knowledge, but I haven't read it all yet; there's a lot of stuff in there that goes way far back. My family is English, Irish and Welsh, and my great-grandfather (who was Welsh) used to say: "It goes like this, lassie: the Irish hate the English; the English hate the Scots. The Scots hate the Welsh, and the Welsh hate 'em all."

"It goes like this, lassie: the Irish hate the English; the English hate the Scots. The Scots hate the Welsh, and the Welsh hate 'em all."

Wonderful, Flynne!

If you want a holiday in hell - you need to be among a party of Brits who decide to rent a vacation cottage in Wales from a Welsh Nationalist owner!

(25 years later I am only just starting to find it funny...)

holiday in hell I can imagine! I'm Scottish and worked with a mostly English team in Italy for a while. We'd all go out for a meal and the restaurant owner would ask "Are you English?" to which the general reply was "Yes!" One night I cause uproar by getting in first with "No, we're all Scottish!" (Try substituting "American" and "Canadian" or whatever your local nationalities are.)

If the company's good then a mixed crowd is the best in my opinion. I love listening to all the different accents, and then realising that mine sounds just as different to everyone else. Oddly enough it's a situation in which I can feel that I "belong." I find the the US melting pot just as welcoming for the same reason.

" I find the the US melting pot just as welcoming for the same reason."

Absolutely agree, Norman.

(Though you might want to avoid dinner parties on the north shore of Long Island. The only "melting pot" is when they serve fondue...said with a bitter chuckle!)

Here's another good article about the psychology behind fundamentalist Islam and suicide bombings:
http://counterterror.typepad.com/the_counterterrorism_blog/2005/07/interview_with_.html

Saw this at a Scottish store ("if it's not Scottish, it's craaaap!") in Appalachia:

First came the Scottish,
Who prayed on their knees...
And on their neighbors.

Then came the Welsh,
Who kept the Sabbath...
And anything else they could find.

Third came the Irish,
Who didn't know what they wanted...
But were willing to fight for it anyway.

Lastly came the English,
Who considered themselves a self-made nation...
Thus absolving the Almight of a dreadful responsibility.

"I can understand they came off this pedestal when people figured out the connection between sex and babies, but not how that turned into such repression as we have now." Bad application of primitive logic, Jeff knows all about this. The subjugation of women stems from paternity rights, the biological ones. It should be an utterly mute point now but we still have issues with this. The only way to ensure (I'm using this in the physical sense of the word) that the child you raise is yours is to keep her locked away from all other males for ever. Back in the day you couldn't tell if a women was really pregnant or not until weeks or months (depending on the women) after conception. So how do you make sure the baby is your, marry a virgin and look her up in a tower. Certain groups went further with genital mutilation but the concept is basically the same. This is a barbaric way of making sure that your blood line sits on your throne, farm, horse, etc. Just a theory but the only rationale one I can see.

The sick by product of a patriarchal society.

should be an utterly mute point now but we still have issues with this.

moot point.

A "moot" point is one that is open to debate. I think you mean the exact opposite - that the case should be closed by now?

Anyway, what you say makes historical sense. But is patriarchy universal in human society, or just in Abrahamic religions? I could imagine, for example, if you lived in a part of the world where life was easy (plenty fruit trees, nice weather, stupid, easily-caught animals to eat, etc) that looking after children would not be so hard and you might not care too much who looked after whose offspring. Something like the Pacific islands comes to mind.

Actually the whole issue only becomes important to men if they have to invest in their offspring. Which is essential if said offspring are helpless infants for several years, which in turn is due to birth canal limits on neonatal skull size. (By contrast, an antelope child is fairly independent about 10 minutes after birth.) Children without fathers or a tribe to help care for them would die, so we end up with involved fathers. Other apes don't have this problem, as far as I know, and their fathers are not involved after sex.

This is all speculation - it's not my area - but it's fun.

Paternity does have alot to do with it without a doubt. But there is more to it than that.

Its a simple matter of population. The taking of enemy women by raids etc. is a long standing practice, and the need for population to sow fields, hunt, fight, etc. are all well established needs even long before the invention of writing. Populations that put their women in harms way inevitably would have smaller populations over time. By this standard, women are precious resources...while men are fundamentally expendable.

Consider two hypothetical villages. Village A and Village B. Both have equal populations totalling 500 persons, both evenly split between men & women. 200 of each.

Let us say village A & B have a dispute, one that erupts into violent conflict.

Village A is patriarchal, and sends its men to battle. (War being the means to political and social dominance since long before Sargon) Village B is more egaletarian, and fields 100 men & 100 women. Things are tough, and only 30 men of Village A make it home, while only 15 men & 15 women make it home to village B.

Now those 30 men of village A can repopulate and even exceed their former population within a few years, even if only 1 man had survived, just because he can knock up the entire female population. Village B, having lost almost half of its female population, and each woman being able to add to the population only once per year, finds its rebuilding going much...MUCH slower. The next time conflict erupts, village A will almost inevitably out number village B, and probably win without much difficulty, resulting in the siezure of any surviving female population, adding to its own collective. Thus eliminating essentially in a single day, any egaletarian ideal.

And so, war being the chief means to power & dominion over a region, it is not surprising that with women essentially excluded from that activity, a patriarchal culture would emerge almost everywhere in the world. Even long after the original concern for having a population growth is gone, the culture remained in place.

Its a bit ironic that the very thing that made the protection of a population's women essential, almost without variation also shunted them away from power, public life, and social status.

There are exceptions to be found in the world of course, Celts were much more egaletarian, and had women involved in war & positions of power, but they are an exception, not the rule.

But the idea of female oppression even within a patriarchal society, is sometimes misleading. Many cultures have social status change over time, and dependent upon factors other than simply sex. Feminists don't like to discuss the intricacies of cultural difference, because it means they might have to do REAL research, & spend time away from their antiporn, antifamily, antimale, victim industrial complex.

MUCH easier to just say, "Womyn are oppressed! Make us feel better!"

If I could roll my eyes enough on that crap...they'd roll right out of my head. *L*

Robet you forgot to point out that the Celts were virtually wiped out by the Romans