19/03/2026
I love this…
Matriarchy is not patriarchy but with women in charge. Matriarchy is a nonhiearchical society designed in a circular fashion with the most vulnerable in the center.
It's care-centered community, connection to mother earth, gift economy, honoring the Beingness of all life. It's a completely different structure without power-over domination.
The definition of matriarchy is determined by actual matriarchal indigenous societies, not the dictionary. The wealthy, western educated, white dudes who make dictionaries have no clue what actual matriarchy is.
When people attempt to define matriarchy as a society dominated by women, THAT is a culturally biased myth. That is epistemic violence - the erasure of marginalized knowledge by a dominant group of people.
Patriarchy is men at the top. Women at the top of a dominant system of hierarchy is actually still patriarchal supremacy, just gender swapped.
Matriarchy is earth at the center, then mothers and children to the middle. The community circles around to protect them. No one is above anyone else.
I thought this was common-ish knowledge among people who are doing anti-oppression type work, but several comments on my last post assumed that matriarchy is a type of supremacy and nothing could be farther from the truth.
Image credit: https://substack.com/
I did not make this image.
PS. I am not advocating for anything in this post. I am teaching you the broader definition of matriarchy. My last post theorized that matriarchal societies would not produce any people with personality disorders, that those complex trauma syndromes are a product of colonial patriarchal capitalism, and some people seemed confused about what matriarchy is.
If this post makes you think, huh, that's not what I thought it meant.... please keep thinking about it! Don't try to convince me otherwise. I'm adding resources for further reading below.
