If women ruled the world

What if women ruled the world? What if society decided to replace masculine values with feminine values? Would this be a better world?

I was wondering what to write for my New Year’s column. At first, all I could say was that 2018 would just be an extension of 2017. In the Philippines, headlines would still be dominated by insurgency movements, drug wars, economy and politics. The 2019 mid term elections will be the political topic of the year and positioning will now be the center of discussions and negotiations. There will be more Senate and congressional hearings and more exposes. 

In the rest of the world, North Korea, China’s rise to power, terrorism, increasing cultural polarization and climate change will dominate the headlines. There will be more scandals due to the inevitable march of social media. 

The world will talk about the coming Age of Artificial Intelligence and its impact on our daily lives. Income inequality and globalization will be debated but eventually accepted as inevitable. People talk about change but the solutions being proposed are all from the past. Pope Francis says capitalism does not work but what will replace capitalism? Socialism was a utopian ideal but that has also been proven a failure. Populism is the present answer but that too has proven to fail in the past. So what’s next – fascism, militarism, feudalism, dictatorship, oligarchy?

We are entering a new age that will be so vastly different from anything history has seen. The new age of AI will completely change our lives. One effect will be the fact that physical strength and brawn will become less and less important. Wars will be fought by drones and cyber warfare. Physically demanding jobs like construction, manufacturing, driving, mining and agriculture will be done by robots. The term “workplace” will also change as the world becomes more internet connected. There will be less need for people to occupy the same physical space in order to work together. 

There have been great women leaders in the past. Today, there are women occupying positions of power like Angela Merkel of Germany and Theresa May of the United Kingdom. But they are a tiny minority. They also have to lead in a male dominated world and oftentimes embrace masculine values like being “tough” and not being a “cry baby.” Joan of Arc was a warrior and Margaret Thatcher was the Iron Lady. Most women leaders inherited their positions from their parents like Indira Gandhi of India and Aung San Suu Kyi of Myanmar.

The year 2017 was the year of populism; but in many ways it was also the year of women. In the Western world, women brought public attention to male sexual harassment which led to the fall of men of power. Perhaps this is an indication of the growing power of women in society. In Saudi Arabia and Iran women have been given more rights and they are demanding more. 

I am now reading a book  by Marin Seymour Smith called The 100 Most Influential Books Ever Written: The History of Thought from Ancient Times to Today. The books selected here are those with fundamental influence. The emphasis falls more upon philosophy, on thinking than upon literature. The books are listed chronologically. It begins with I Ching which became the foundation for the Confucian and Taoist way of life. It includes the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the Koran. It ends with Beyond Freedom and Dignity by B.F. Skinner.

According to the author, these are the books that have influenced humankind’s thinking since the beginning of civilization. The most striking thing is that only three of the 100 books were written by women – Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft: The Second Sex by Simone de Baeuvoir; and Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan. 

In 1792, Mary Wollstonecraft wrote in her book: “Strengthen the female mind by enlarging it and there will be an end to blind obedience; but as blind obedience is ever sought by power, tyrants and sensualists are in the right when they endeavor to keep women in the dark because the former only wants slaves, and the latter a play thing.” Today women, in any parts of the world are still struggling to be educated but are being prevented by men in power who want them as slaves or play things.

In the Second Sex, Simone writes that women must stop being like men and that they are the “Other.” She writes: “In truth women have never set up female values in opposition to male values. It is desirous of maintaining  masculine prerogatives, has invented the divergence... For when she begins her adult life she does not have behind her the same past as does a boy...the universe presents itself to her in a different perspective...she refuses to confine herself to her role as a female because it would involve mutilation, but it would also be a mutilation to repudiate her sex.”

In her book, Friedan asks: “But what happens when women try to live according to an image that makes them deny their minds? What happens when women grow up in an image that makes them deny the reality of a changing world?”

Perhaps the next list of 100 most influential books will be written mainly by women. What would the world be like if female values replace masculine values as the dominant philosophy. Would it be a better world?

I really do not know. Perhaps there will be less violence. The family  life may be strengthened as women have always been the bulwark of family life. All I know now is that the old ideas have not worked. The world needs a new idea, a new philosophy.

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