Dominant women

[Amra]

Something’s been bugging me since I began reading the WoT series, and I couldn’t figure it out. Today I realised what it was.

 

My wife is a writer, and a few years ago she researched and interviewed for an article on ‘female domination’.

 

When most people hear those words, they think of the archetypal dominatrix, all leather, whips and chains etc. But there’s a whole subsection of that community that believes in the female being the dominant one in the relationship between husband and wife or boyfriend and girlfriend, without recourse to the overtly sexual and pornographic stereotype of dominant women.

 

Reading the literature they produce, they believe that women are superior to men, and insist that men are subservient to them at all times, and obey without question. As a model for correct behaviour, they often cite the concept of chivalry, the medieval knight and his lady etc. This perfectly describes the relationship between Aes Sedai and Warders.

 

It also describes, in varying degrees, the relationship between ‘ordinary’ men and women, at one end of the scale, the concept amongst the Aiel where the woman selects her husband and proposes, and at the extreme end, the Ayyad of Shara who consider males fit for breeding only.

 

Within the ‘fem-dom’ world, women use specific techniques to make their men more submissive: some are obviously sexual, such as the concept of chastity for the male, but others involve regular beatings with leather straps or switches, and there’s an awful lot of birchings and similar punishments dished out in WoT, amongst the Aes Sedai, the rebels, and the Shaido and other Aiel clans.

 

Now, I’m in no way speculating about RJ’s private life: it’s none of my (our) business, but whether he was ‘involved’ in that world or not, it seems pretty clear to me from the uncanny similarities between WoT and ‘fem-dom’, that he was at least aware of that sub-culture.

 

If anyone wants to compare the similarities, a good place to start might be www.elisesutton.com, a mostly psycho-analytical, Q&A, and text-based exploration of that lifestyle. Please be warned however: while there is nothing on that site that I personally would deem “pornographic”, if you are offended by sexual scenes or are viewing it at work, you would be wise to avoid the art galleries, and concentrate on the articles and other texts.

 

Other (non-porn) links of interest, on a similar theme:

http://www.venus-on-top.com/index.html

 

http://www.aroundherfinger.com/index.html

 

 

[Myyrth]

I personally find the concept of a necessary "dominant" in a relationship to be inherently absurd.  Their may be differences between genders but to operate under the illusion that one gender is "superior" is silly and it's one thing i've struggled with when reading WoT.  Both male and female, the characters can be so depressingly one dimensional in their gender bias.

 

On the topic of that particular sub-culture of dominant females I wonder what they think they are talking about when they refer to Chivalry as an example of that sort of dominant female behavior.  Chivalry works on the assumed social understanding that women are in fact inherently inferior to men and are therefore in need of protection.  It is an expression of the Knights self will and honor that he is kind to maidens.  It's a self empowerment thing not a sacrifice for my mistress thing.  The Aes Sedai and Warder relationship is very divorced from the medieval concept of chivalry, but similar to the female domination concept.  Chivalry itself governed more than simply the relationship between men and women after all.  It was a good old boys club were everyone dressed up in heavy armor and killed peasants.  It was a method of governing social hierarchy in the feudal court systems.  It was a badge of economic rank.  Being kind to damsels was just a part of a much larger picture.

 

 

Regardless, social need for a "dominant" is a laughably mundane human desire. It's part of what forces divisions at many levels of society.  Rich over Poor, Liberal over Conservative, Man over Women.  Traditional norms that are occasionally subverted through counter-culture groups (such as fem-dom).  Still, it's sad that we move so slowly as a society, always take a step back for every two steps forward.

[Agitel]

I find the WoT to be only slight skewed towards women, and that's because of a long-standing power gap left by there being no male Aes Sedai. It's obvious that the girls of the series have skewed views as well, they've spent far too long in, around, and being indoctrinated by an elitist, all female group living in their own little ivory tower on an island shaped like female genitalia. As a whole, the world seems very much balanced in gender equality, if not gender neutrality. Some societies in the world are more skewed than others.

 

Both Illian and Tear seem dominated by men. Cairhien, Altara and Ghealdan seem more equal. Andor and Seanchan seem equal at all ranks except at the level of Queen/Empress. Tarabon has its own balance between King and Panarch. Arad Doman is somewhat muddled to me. I'd say Aiel culture is equal as well. Some may say Wise Ones get higher status than Clan Chiefs, but to really think about it, Dreaming and Dreamwalking are very rare talents in men and most likely the ability of many Wise Ones who can channel is why they're granted safe status, as both a protection to them and as an expectation that they'll keep their powers in check. Far Madding, however, is a society dominated by women. Among Ogier, woman do seem the dominant sex in relationships however. Among the Sea Folk we have an odd relationship. Certainly the women hold a great deal of power politically, but the men seem to hold the power in private.

 

 

[Amra]

Yes, Myyrth, I agree: men and women are different, but their strengths and weaknesses should complement each other, not lead to a society where one is permanently dominant over the other. But in WoT, it is definitely a case of the women in every country, generally being dominant over the men. There are many male characters who act in a dominant manner of course, but mostly around other men, not towards women. There seems to be an underlying subtext that women are the natural rulers. I wonder if RJ deliberately inverted this male/female dominance just to make the WoT world as different from our own as possible, or whether he was making a point about it?

 

Agitel, I see what you mean, but rather than on an organisational level, I was talking more about individual reaction to each gender. Overall, even in those countries that have male rulers, the men still respect and obey the women far more than in our own (Western) society.

 

Yesterday I was chatting to a girl on the train, who I noticed was reading the same book as me (Book 10, although she was on her third reading, me on the first): we got talking, and she said she loves the whole idea of the WoT society where women are more dominant. Maybe RJ deliberately wrote to appeal more to women readers? I'd be interested to know what the gender demographic of readers is: more female than male, vice versa, or roughly equal?

[Nightstrike]

Thus Spake The Creator - Women and Men

 

Q: You've thought out your characters so clearly and their personalities are so complex. How hard was it to do this? Did it take a lot of planning ahead or did it just come naturally as you progressed into the writing?

RJ: There was a lot of planning ahead involved with the characters, and a lot of work -- with the women characters in particular, to try to make them seem like women instead of women written by a man.

 

Q: Let's talk about the Wheel of Time series. Does it appeal both to men and women the same?

RJ: It does. My English publisher commissioned a survey, and the managing director took us to dinner and said to me at the table, "We've discovered that your readership is perfectly spherical." I said, "What are you telling me? They're fat? What are you saying?"

He said that apparently in England, my readership is evenly distributed according to age level. Evenly distributed according to income level. Evenly distributed according to educational level, according to political party, according to area of the country they live in. Every single category it was even distribution. He said we could not find a significant statistical bump anywhere. Now, there's no such survey for the United States. All I have is the fan mail and the people who show up at the signings. But I have 12 year old kids and I have people in their 80s. I have gangbangers and cops. I get letters from convicts. I have college students and doctors and housewives. I had teenage girls telling me things like, "You are sooo cool." I mean, good Lord, I felt like a rock star. I found that Sir Edmond Hillary is a fan of my books. I found that a high official in the Russian government hands my books out, telling people that they are not a manual of politics but a manual of the poetry of politics. There is no typical Robert Jordan reader.

 

RJ's blog 6 October 2005 "AND ONE MORE TIME"

 

For Anonymous-George, long ago I saw one of the first, I believe, novels about a young woman who wasn’t allowed to use magic or whatever because she was a woman, and the thought occurred to me as to how it might go if men were the ones who were denied the right to do magic.  Or whatever.  I hate using the word magic.  From that long ago thought grew the One Power divided into saidin and saidar with the male half tainted and the reasons for and results of it being tainted.  Now in most of these societies — Far Madding is the obvious exception — I did not and do not view them as matriarchal.  I attempted to design societies that were as near gender balanced as to rights, responsibilities and power as I could manage.  It doesn’t all work perfectly.  People have bellybuttons.  If you want to see someone who always behaves logically, never tells small lies or conceals the truth in order to put the best face for themselves on events, and never, ever tries to take advantage of any situation whatsoever, then look for somebody without a bellybutton.  The real surprise to me was that while I was designing these gender balanced societies, people were seeing matriarchies.

 

[Nightstrike]

Aes Sedai have probably been special cases. Some of them...

 

RJ's blog 5 October 2005 "YET ANOTHER, IT SEEMS"

 

For Mark A, there are plenty of reasons for men and women to have a certain degree of distrust, though the fact that many Aes Sedai have Warders and good relationships with them shows that it isn’t all mistrust.  How much trust do most men and women have for the opposite gender here and now?  I trust Harriet with my life, but look at how most people are.  Look at most women’s views of men, and most men’s views of women.  There is a lot of distrust right there.  As for the Forsaken, they don’t trust anybody.  Gender doesn’t enter into it.

 

Crossroads of Twilight eBook "Glimmers" Interview

 

RJ:

...

I simply decided to write in a world where the feminist struggle occurred so long ago that no one even remembers it. People in this world may think that a woman acting as a guard on a merchant’s train of wagons is odd, but just because it’s a rare sight. (When weapons depend on upper body strength, as swords, spears, halberds and bows do, the people who end up wielding the weapons are usually those with the greatest upper body strength.) But if a merchant or a magistrate or a dock worker is a woman, that’s just part of the description. I mean, the most powerful single group in this world for the last three thousand plus years is all-female. The Aes Sedai are actually the most sexist bunch in town, in many ways. In the eyes of most of them, a Warder is a man. The very notion of a female strikes them as peculiar and even uneasy-making.

 

[Amra]

Fascinating, Nightstrike, thank you very much.

 

For me, the most interesting quote was "The real surprise to me was that while I was designing these gender balanced societies, people were seeing matriarchies."

 

We all view the world through our own particular lenses, shaped by our own experience. For me, as a 50 yr old male, I grew up in a world where men were dominant. That's changed somewhat, obviously, and for the better, but it's still not "gender balanced" even though we have more women politicians and business leaders and lawyers etc than we used to have 30 or 40 years ago.

 

Perhaps then, my own particular 'lenses', when confronted with a world designed to be "gender balanced" see a greater emphasis on women than was intended, simply because in real life, I'm not used to it? Who knows? That's one for the analyst's couch LOL.

 

However, I wasn't really examining the political structures of the societies as a whole, just the personal interaction between individuals, taken collectively.

 

And it's clear from your quotes that RJ did deliberately write to include women (and successfully, if his readership is equal), which explains why some of the passages seem so forced to me, a male reader. Do female readers skip the battle passages, like we males skip the dress details? I would imagine some of them do. But kudos to him for attempting a difficult task!

[Durinax]

I always thought that RJ wrote with women as the more dominant sex was to be a contrast to our own history in many ways, and to kind of illustrate the old quote 'behind a great man is a great woman' although he could have also sought to illustrate how often one person will be more dominant in a relationship and he often brought up things like womens circles and organizations that help women steer the relationship and such, which brings another quote about organization (this is soldiering based but I believe it is relevant) 'Through good order comes bravery, through disorder comes cowardice'

[ranjitb]

Despite what Robert Jordan may have thought, any society in which roles are prescribed (and therefore, limited) based on gender cannot be gender balanced.

 

Case in point - the supposedly gender balanced Sea Folk. So I take it we are assuming that men are completely incapable of captaining ships, or sitting on legislative councils, while women are completely incapable of running trade or fighting in the military. Not.

Further, the public and professional standing of any man is based entirely on the public and professional standing of his wife. How wonderful. Sucks to be you though, if you happen to hook up with an incompetent wife, or like being single, or (heaven forbid) a gay man.

And finally the "obey in public, dominate in private" arrangement between husband and wife - are you kidding me, really ? A codified standard of "Let the little woman have her way, as long as you can put her in her place where it matters - in bed." Really ? GAG.

[kenpoguy]

I did as paper YEARS ago about binary opposition, (think Jacques Derrida for those who dabble in philosophy) and covered a lot of this.

 

I started as the story started, in a world where men could not touch the power that was once available to all. Women could touch the power and use to control men who tried to use it. Men would also suffer harm from touching the power even if the women didn't stop them.

 

The women who use the power influence nations, and guide events.

 

And then this little arrangement is turned on its head by a man who has to channel to save the world. He can channel immense amounts of the power and begins teaching other men to channel. These men make some of the women swear fealty to them. It appears to be levelling out. Men can touch the power without the physical issues (no taint) and the Reds are all but decimated to be able to hunt down male channelers.

 

Where men were in charge of the big event the first time around, I believe they are realizing they need to both have men and women present to seal the deal.

[Agitel]

Despite what Robert Jordan may have thought, any society in which roles are prescribed (and therefore, limited) based on gender cannot be gender balanced.

 

Case in point - the supposedly gender balanced Sea Folk. So I take it we are assuming that men are completely incapable of captaining ships, or sitting on legislative councils, while women are completely incapable of running trade or fighting in the military. Not.

Further, the public and professional standing of any man is based entirely on the public and professional standing of his wife. How wonderful. Sucks to be you though, if you happen to hook up with an incompetent wife, or like being single, or (heaven forbid) a gay man.

And finally the "obey in public, dominate in private" arrangement between husband and wife - are you kidding me, really ? A codified standard of "Let the little woman have her way, as long as you can put her in her place where it matters - in bed." Really ? GAG.

 

I'm pretty sure the 'in private' goes far beyond the 'in bed' part. Also, I know that Nynaeve and Lan got to choose who got private power and who got public power, I'm not sure if this was because they were outsiders and were given some leeway, or if the same holds true for the Sea Folk in many cases.

 

Either way, we're talking about the world as a whole, not just the Sea Folk. There are certainly some societies in the world that are tilted more one way than the other. I do think 3000 years of Aes Sedai and only women channelers have given women the upper hand in some areas, but as a whole, the societies seem balanced.  I disagree with your assertion that we need gender neutrality.

[Durinax]

Despite what Robert Jordan may have thought, any society in which roles are prescribed (and therefore, limited) based on gender cannot be gender balanced.

 

Case in point - the supposedly gender balanced Sea Folk. So I take it we are assuming that men are completely incapable of captaining ships, or sitting on legislative councils, while women are completely incapable of running trade or fighting in the military. Not.

Further, the public and professional standing of any man is based entirely on the public and professional standing of his wife. How wonderful. Sucks to be you though, if you happen to hook up with an incompetent wife, or like being single, or (heaven forbid) a gay man.

And finally the "obey in public, dominate in private" arrangement between husband and wife - are you kidding me, really ? A codified standard of "Let the little woman have her way, as long as you can put her in her place where it matters - in bed." Really ? GAG.

 

I'm pretty sure the 'in private' goes far beyond the 'in bed' part. Also, I know that Nynaeve and Lan got to choose who got private power and who got public power, I'm not sure if this was because they were outsiders and were given some leeway, or if the same holds true for the Sea Folk in many cases.

 

Either way, we're talking about the world as a whole, not just the Sea Folk. There are certainly some societies in the world that are tilted more one way than the other. I do think 3000 years of Aes Sedai and only women channelers have given women the upper hand in some areas, but as a whole, the societies seem balanced.  I disagree with your assertion that we need gender neutrality.

The dominant in public and subservient in private among the sea folk seems to work pretty well, it takes away the jealousy of one gender if they are lower inthe ranks than the other, and it is not just the get in bed thing, it could be a lot of stuff, such as asking them to do somehing outside of private in order to make things bettwer between them, etc. And if you gag about the bed thing, it is the only place the men have any power in this system, since typically the women always have higher posts, unless they are reduced to the bottom.

[NetSlider]

Men and women, to me at least, is very simple (and yet impossibly complex) to explain - it's a collision of Mars and Viennese. "The Domination" is not something that have been achieved (subversion is more likely would be the words to apply for the last 4 thousand years), but the struggle for one sex to "change" or "shape" the opposite into a "perfect thing" is definitively was, is, and will be going on as long as there are men and women.

 

(I wrote an essay about it couple years back because the item was interesting to me at the time, some people liked it, others didn't. Especially women friends called me a pig after first page, but after finishing the whole thing they actually agreed with me on most of the things. If interested, PM me and I'll send you a copy).