In cultures and societies systems of control can be subtle things. When you’re socialized since birth that you are a certain way, born to be a certain thing everything can seem normal.

In Patriarchy men are objects. They are tools. They enforce social norms. Their value is determined by their ability to hold up the social structure it supports. If men are not useful to the patriarchy, they are worthless no matter their potential.

There are many ways to look at Patriarchy and how it functions and oppresses. For this article I posit that Patriarchy is a dual system. It is a system where Men oppress women, and where Men oppress themselves and each other. A fundamental assumption here is that “A society could not have the kinds of power dynamics that exist between women and men in our society without certain kinds of systematic power dynamics operating among men as well.”(Pleck, 1995)

The Hierarchy of Masculinity

Patriarchy is ingrained in our society, so much so that we unconsciously seek to rank ourselves with others. In patriarchal societies Men are ranked above women, but more subtly there’s usually a secondary ranking among Men. In many societies men are ranked by common factors: their race, physical strength, their height, the dynasty they belong to, their wealth, their sexual orientation, or their gender conformity. In Mormonism most of those classical factors come into play, with the addition of another factor that women definitely can’t have: their priesthood authority. For the Church, masculinity has been essentially tied to priesthood power.

An Initiation

Mormon culture is dominated by patriarchy. It objectifies men throughout their life. Starting in earnest at age 12 a child is called in to speak with his Bishop. He is asked a series of questions. One of those questions asks if they believe in the Restoration, and if Joseph Smith was a prophet. If the child is lucky they won’t be asked if they are sexually active, or if they masturbate. The former question is designed to ensure the child has a sufficient understanding of the importance of the institution. As a boy progresses through the priesthood he reaches milestones. At each milestone comes more responsibility and an increased expectation of conformity.

Carrots and Sticks

With priesthood comes the opportunity for leadership. A boy’s willingness to accept these instructions may hinder or help their ability to participate or hold leadership callings. Leadership callings are another strata in which power is granted in this system. You could hold the same priesthood office as thousands of others, but if you can also attain “priesthood keys” your stature is even higher.

The Church controls the narrative regarding sex and marriage. At 16 a typical latter-day saint is allowed to start dating. Young women in the Church are encouraged to only date worthy priesthood holders. Missionaries are told, in hushed tones that hard work will result in a more beautiful bride. Woman are considered tangible symbols of success, trophies of dedicated service. Throughout Mormon doctrine women are given to men to be lorded over, protected, and guided. In its highest and most holy ordinance women cannot look upon God without hiding their faces. They do not covenant with God except through their husbands. To be entirely fair, not every woman feels this way, but many do, and because many women are so accustomed seeing through a male perspective when they are excluded it’s not always easy to see how exclusionary the rite can feel for some.

Entrenchment

The Temple Endowment is a sacred ceremony wherein the participant makes, among other things, an oath of obedience and sacrifice to the Church, and also vows to never speak ill of “The Lord’s Anointed”. The ceremony doesn’t give a chance to opt out before the participant knows what they’re getting into. Some individuals love the ceremony, others leave the temple never to return, still others struggle with the ceremony quietly, put away their concerns, and suppress their feelings of disappointment or betrayal. One thing is certain, to move forward in Mormonism the temple has to be accepted as a reality of their future no matter how they feel about it. It will become a reoccurring test of their loyalty as they are asked to return often. To be accepted fully as a latter-day saint this man must obtain and maintain a temple recommend. This recommend requires regular interviews where the individual is asked to affirm their commitment to the church and their support of its leaders.

Enforcement

If a man does not maintain his temple recommend it can lead to very visible consequences. He may not be able to baptize his children, not because he questions the resurrection, but because he has doubts about current or past leaders of the Church. He may not be able to ordain his own sons to the priesthood. He may not be able to give his baby a blessing. Each of these rites are expected of priesthood holders, yet the privilege may be withheld by the patriarchy. Instead of the father performing the rite, a surrogate may be chosen to stand in the father’s place. Being unable to participate can cause marital distress with an orthodox partner who may not fully understand the struggle of her husband. Because of the nature of belief, it’s not his or her fault. The feelings are a natural outgrowth of the expectations hoisted on the couple. She expects him to be worthy and to uphold his priesthood. He, for whatever reason, cannot pay the personal price the patriarchy asks of him. This conflict can lead to broken homes and relationships and is one more way that it uses relationship dynamics to pressure men to conform. LDS doctrine implicitly teaches that unrighteous parents may lose their spouses and their children in the afterlife to more righteous individuals. In the LDS church this leads to the question: are we families, or are we dynasties? Are we a group of related people who love and rely on one another, or is this about power, inheritance, obligation, and control?

Along with the expectation of providing for the physical well-being of their family, men are also tasked with the spiritual guidance of every member of the family. Rather than saying that men and women share the responsibility in the home men are expected to “preside”. While this doesn’t explicitly say that the woman can’t lead, it can result in resentment when the person who is expected to preside doesn’t meet his partner’s ideal. Assuming that a man wants to share this responsibility with his wife, that wife may have institutionally ingrained expectations: that he should always lead family prayer, morning and night, he should always initiate Family Home Evening, he should always call on someone for prayers before meals, he should enforce orthodoxy in the home, and call his children in for regular personal interviews. While these expectations may be fine in some relationships, if a man has a differing view of parenting or spirituality than the woman and is not equally yoked it can lead to disappointment and resentment. Alternatively, if the man is more orthodox than the woman in the relationship she may feel resentment that he excludes her from a position of leadership and doesn’t allow her to lead where a man would traditionally lead, or give input on how to spiritually guide their children. This last point leads to the most important failing of patriarchy. Patriarchy demands the excision of self. It may give lip service to agency and self-determination, but it discards those expressions insofar as they conflict with its own goals.

Role Discrepancy

Not always obvious in a discussion of gender roles is the effect that the ideal has on the self-esteem of the individual. For a believing member of the Church the gap between the ideal and their own perceived reality can have a lasting effect on their psyche. Psychologists call this gap a discrepancy strain. While this strain may have a real short term effect its long term effects are believed to diminish as the individual reconciles and resolves the strain by either modifying their behavior, perception of self, or the validity of the ideals that they had been measuring themselves against.

The outcome of gender discrepancy strain can sometimes be negative resulting in increased long term stress, but it can also lead to a positive outcome. For example, a young man may be told that a worthy priesthood holder does not masturbate, while his own behavior conflicts with this ideal. The young man could feel persistent guilt on this topic, or he may decide that masturbation is a normal part of his sexual development, leading to a resolution where the individual determines that the ideal needs to change to accommodate his own self-concept.

One roadblock to this type of self-realization and reconciliation is that the Church requires regular checkpoints with children where these sometimes problematic concepts of loyalty and sexual purity are reinforced. The young man may just be an interview away from being scolded about masturbation, or lying about the topic, leading to yet another possible episode of strain.

Men’s Power in Church

Patriarchy is a system that uses women and men to achieve an end. There’s a difference between what Patriarchy does to the people in it, and what happens to the men who embrace patriarchy and live within the system. There’s a lot to explore on this topic and a discussion on leadership callings can illustrate the point nicely.

Relationally, men benefit from the hierarchy of the Church, but what’s not as plain to see is that men ultimately have very little power over their lives inside the system. Men have a measure of power over women and also exert power over other men. The paradox here is that the more power and control they have over other men the less self-determination they have. The institution extracts the power and resources they have over their own lives and subsumes them. As a man moves up the hierarchy they may go from one calling to the next. Each calling may put them in a position of power over other men, and the more power they have over other men the more consuming the position becomes. As a Ward Mission President I was asked to spend 10 hours a week on my (lowly) calling, Elders Quorum presidencies regularly clock more hours. Bishops conservatively spend 20 or more hours a week on their callings. I have heard it generously referred to as “another full time job”. This time and energy is taken away from what could be shared responsibilities in the home, hobbies, or other self-determined activities.

It’s not self evident to everyone that being a better priesthood holder makes you a better father, and that service to the church makes you a better partner. It is, however, self evident that callings and leadership positions often conflict with household responsibilities that put an undue burden on the partner. This system, intentionally or unintentionally, encourages a man to prioritize the church over family when resolving his role within his own self-determined ideal. In the words of a dear friend “I’m not sure how life would have looked if we hadn’t been influenced by [this system], but it would have been ours”.

The Rub

By conforming to patriarchal demands a man risks losing his sense of self and risks seeing others as merely objects. Ensconced in the system people are reduced to what they can do to bolster the system they benefit from. Rather than seeing a woman as a person they are evaluated on how well they can clean, cook, raise children, and run errands. Rather than seeing another man for the person he is he is evaluated on how well he can recite the words at the veil, his willingness to obey counsel, if he pays tithing, how much free time he has to dedicate to church callings, and if his children remain righteous. This is the fatal flaw in patriarchy. It’s not that it doesn’t create a society that can, at some level, be successful, but that it does so at the expense of the very thing that makes us humans. Liberation for men is ultimately tied to the liberation of women.

More Reading

[1] http://imaginenoborders.org/pdf/zines/UnderstandingPatriarchy.pdf

[2] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259693976_Understanding_Men_and_Masculinity_in_Modern_Society