The First Rebellion – II
Was the rebellious streak an acquired personality trait or a natural disposition? The first rebellion might tell something about it.
“Yeah, but that’s patriarchy,” she said. The sudden invocation of patriarchy for an explanation (more like an impassioned indictment, from the sound of it) did not sit too well in the context of the discussion but I did not point it out or try to course-correct the flow of the conversation because it seemed more interesting to see where she was going with patriarchy even though she was clearly confusing patriarchy with patrilineality. But then, in certain contexts, the distinction between the two is inconsequential and academic. So, I thought it better to wait for her blurry start to focus so that her point could come to light. And since I was just casually sharing a discussion I had had with someone at some point of time in the recent past, a new line of conversation appeared more appealing to me.
But as the exchange progressed, it revealed how common and easy it is, even among the educated people, to fail to critically examine their own ideas and conclusions. Interestingly, the conversation I was sharing when she came up with her patriarchy input was also about another highly educated person failing to examine rhetoric in the light of plain facts.
In the context of the original conversation, it was a significant fact that the Hindu caste system operated through patrilineal kinship, meaning that the son takes the caste of the father rather than the mother, and is part of father’s clan (khaandaan) and not the mother’s. That’s because the bride is married “into” the family of the groom and becomes a part of his family after marriage, which is basically conversion by marriage. “Maybe there was a break somewhere in the chain and that’s why,” she had said, trying to explain why a Brahmin might see himself as a kshatriya or belonging to kshatriya lineage. “No, it’s the father’s line always. So the son of a Brahmin father is a Brahmin. That’s the lineage. Mother’s ancestry doesn’t matter.” “That’s just patriarchy,” she said. “Yes, but that’s there all around.” “It’s in North India mostly,” she said. “Not in South India?” I asked. “South India was matriarchal. Even now there is some matriarchal societies there.”
“Except for some patches in the South and perhaps a tribe or two in the North-East of India, there are hardly any matriarchal societies anywhere in India as far as I know,” I said. “Yes, now. South India became patriarchal when Mughals went there and tribes are patriarchal due to outside influence. Because of our influence,” she explained. “Okay. So, South India was matriarchal before the Mughals? And the tribes before the influence of our patriarchy were matriarchal? So, tribes untouched by civilization should also be all matriarchal then, no?”
She then talked about the Cholas in the context of matriarchy, implying that society was matriarchal during the time of the Cholas. I did not enter the discussion about the Cholas because the interaction was obviously not going anywhere, and next question that occurred to me was: “So, between the Cholas and the Mughal, the society was matriarchal?” Instead, before moving to the regular work talk, I briefly reflected on the possible causes of patriarchy, which, being a global phenomenon, could not be conveniently and simplistically explained as a self-serving creation of scheming, evil men. At no point during this entire conversation did I try to set her facts right — not once — because I wasn’t interested in proving her wrong. I just wanted to understand the structure of her thoughts and how she stacked up her “facts” to draw the conclusions she drew. To me the question simply was whether or not her inferences logically followed her assumptions, howsoever factually erroneous the assumptions. That’s why instead of questioning her facts, I floated questions that should have had satisfactory answers, if her conclusions and inferences were valid.
This is not the first time I am sharing a conversation in this column because conversations are revelatory, if you listen beyond words. Conversations, as we all know, are not only about our thoughts and ideas but also about the internal structure of our thinking, which is informed, in no small part, by the deep-seated prejudices lurking in the subconscious more than the ideas we consciously espouse. It is by now well known that human beings are naturally susceptible to confirmation bias and it takes conscious effort of will and critical thinking on our part to avoid stepping on that slippery slope. Interestingly, it’s not quite as difficult as it might seem and takes just a few moments of honest reflections, if you have the necessary mental tools (like intellectual honesty and a healthy disregard for conventions), to see the fallacy of our ways.
In the conversation I shared above, the fallacy begins right when the girl indicts patriarchy for partilineality, not because they are not related and also not because one cannot be explained by the other but simply because patriarchy or, for that matter, patrilineality is not up for debate there; it’s a given and falls beyond the scope of the discussion. If gravity as a reason for the objects to fall to the ground is relevant, it is not automatically relevant to talk about general relativity and space-time distortions caused by mass and energy to explain why gravity exists. Unless such a digression can be fruitfully brought within the scope of the original discussion, it is wholly unwarranted. But for now, let’s allow the girl’s digression, and talk some more about what she wants to talk about — patriarchy.
…to be continued
