Gynocentrism

The Natural Gynocentrism Fallacy

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The natural gynocentrism fallacy, otherwise known as bio-gynocentrism, is a centuries old mythology first promoted in feminist circles, and subsequently to mass culture under the guise of science. Below is a selection of writings elaborating on this fallacy.

– The ‘Natural Gynocentrism Fallacy’ (Hanna Wallen)
– What’s in a suffix? taking a look at the meaning of gyno–centrism (Peter Wright)
– Is Gynocentrism Adaptive? (Peter Ryan)
– Robert Briffault’s Law Doesn’t Apply to Humans (Peter Wright)
– ‘Biological Gynocentrism’: Falling Into The Feminist Trap? (Peter Wright)
– Lester Ward’s Gynocentrism & The Deification of Women (Peter Ryan)
– Eight Traits of the Bio-Gynocentrist (Vernon Meigs)
– Bio-gynocentrism: Turning Science Into Goddess Worship (Peter Ryan)
– Humans as a “Gynocentric Species” is Pure Myth (Peter Wright)
–Presumption Of Male Disposability Is Based On Flawed Hypothesis (Peter Wright)

Robert Briffault insisted his ‘law’ doesn’t apply to humans

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We’ve all heard it before – the claim that we must accept gynocentrism as the default setting for the human species, and for human relationships, because Robert Briffault said it was true a century ago. The only problem is that he didn’t say that at all; its a fabrication by people who have attempted to con us into thinking gynocentrism is the incontrovertible basis of human existence.

Briffault’s law, as stated in his book The Mothers, is this:

“The female, not the male, determines all the conditions of the animal family. Where the female can derive no benefit from association with the male, no such association takes place.”1

Many have embraced Briffault’s Law and applied it to human relationships in a way that Briffault didn’t intend. Briffault applied his law strictly and explicitly to non-human animals in a chapter titled “The Herd And The Family Amongst Animals.”

In the section describing his ‘animal’ law he qualifies that, quote “There is, in fact, no analogy between the animal family and the patriarchal human family. The former is entirely the product of the female’s instincts, and she, not the male, is the head.”

The chapter is five pages long. In it he mentions tigers, elks, lions, zebras, gazelles, buffaloes, deer, monkeys, beavers, lions, birds and other animals, and only references humans briefly in order to contrast human behavioural patterns from those of animals. Briffault says:

“There is in fact no analogy between that [animal] group and the patriarchal human family; to equate the two is a proceeding for which there is no justification. The patriarchal family in the form in which it exists today is a juridic institution. Whatever external and superficial similarities there may be in the constitution of the human and of the animal family, there is one profound and fundamental difference. The patriarchal family is founded upon the supremacy of the male as ‘pater familias,’ as head of the family. This is not the case in the animal family. it is, on the contrary, entirely the product and manifestation of the female’s instincts; she, and not the male, is its head. We may occasionally find the male employed in foraging for the brood and for the mother, while the latter is lying quiescent in charge of her eggs or brood; but there is nothing in those appearances to justify us in regarding the animal family as patriarchal; on the contrary, the conduct of the group is entirely determined not by the male but by the female.”1

Most of what Robert Briffault says is factually incorrect by today’s standard of knowledge. But what we can say without any doubt is that he never applied his “law” to humans. Therefore, let us apply Occam’s razor to this monumental con-job that has been disseminated in the manosphere and beyond.

While we are at it, why not apply the razor to all the other bogus arguments for natural gynocentrism; the people disseminating such unscientific rubbish are not genuinely interested in men’s liberation from the current status quo.

* * *

 

[1]  Robert Briffault, The Mothers: A Study Of The Origins Of Sentiments And Institutions, Volume 1 of 3  (April, 1927)

Maladaptive Gynocentrism

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The following graphic details the maladaptive form of gynocentrism which often gets misrepresented as a benign theory known as “natural gynocentrism.”

Note: certain behaviors associated with gynocentric narcissism may resemble hypergamy. However such behavior is more accurately classed as a narcissistic self-enhancement instead of survival-based enhancements associated with hypergamy. For more on this distinction see: Narcissism Exaggerates Baseline Hypergamy (2023)

Biological Gynocentrism: A Beloved Feminist Fiction

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Lester F. Ward (1841–1913), a pioneering scholar in biology and sociology, was a vocal advocate for first-wave feminism and “women’s liberation.” Like today’s difference feminists, he emphasized biological differences between the sexes and argued that women were the superior sex due to their greater evolutionary and reproductive value.

Sound familiar? It should, because it’s essentially the same gynocentric framework promoted in large parts of the manosphere today, which holds that “women are born with inherent value, and men less so.”

Ward is celebrated as a pioneering male feminist by historian Ann Taylor Allen,1 and Michael Kimmel classifies him as a feminist sociologist.2 Yet it’s not only today’s feminists who champion his ideas. All three waves of feminism embraced his gynocentric theory — or variations of it — as a triumph of scientific truth and as justification for women’s deserved special treatment.

Critics often claim that feminists have never believed in biology — that they’ve always championed blank-slate theory. In reality, feminists have consistently proven to be opportunists: they deny biology when it suits them, and more often appeal to it when convenient. For example, they readily highlight biological facts such as women’s greater vulnerability due to smaller average size, pregnancy, lactation, and menstruation as reasons why women deserve perpetual entitlements. Not to mention that many first-wave feminists openly championed biological gynocentrism (specifically using that term) as a justification for men to further pedestalize and protect women.

Lester Ward delivered his famous “Gynæcocentrism Theory” speech to an enthusiastic group of 1st wave feminists in the year 1888  – including Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Miss Phoebe Couzins, and many others well known.3 The title of the speech was Our Better Halves, and consisted of an elaborate claim that women were biologically superior to males due to their evolutionary and reproductive roles, and thus women were more important than males who were described as mere helpers in the evolutionary scheme.

Ward’s feminist audience rejoiced at his conclusions, which seemed to scientifically validate women’s preeminence at a time when such claims were widely doubted. According to historian Cynthia Davis, this scientific backing for female superiority “led conservatives to identify Darwin as modern feminism’s ‘originator,’ and Ward as its ‘prophet.’”4

First wave feminist Charlotte Perkins-Gilman (1860 – 1935) declared that Ward’s theory of gynocentrism was “the most important contribution to the woman question ever made.”4,5 Addressing doubters, she wrote: “You’ll have to swallow it. The female is the race type; the male is her assistant. It is established beyond peradventure.”6 While continuing to praise Ward’s theory as a brilliant contribution, Gilman went further, arguing that women were more evolutionarily advanced than men and were continuing to evolve at a faster rate.4

In his 1903 book Pure Sociology,7 Ward published a more lengthy chapter explaining his gynæcocentric theory. His theory travelled around the world and fomented feverish debates, as can be seen from this sample of articles published at the time:

Furthermore, Ward’s gynæcocentric theory was enthusiastically championed by Marxists, who saw it as scientific validation for elevating women’s rights. A 1909 article in the socialist newspaper Justice explained its importance this way:

“Why the statement of these theories is of such immense importance to Socialists is that the gynæcocentric theory is a striking corroboration of the correctness of the Marxian interpretation that the economic independence of women will be one of the most important phases of the Social Revolution.”

After tracing the origins of this theory, an obvious question arises: Do we really want to keep promoting these feminist-inspired ideas today?

Whatever one thinks of the scientific merits of Ward’s biological case for gynocentrism (there are none), the theory has flourished ever since — not only in feminist circles and parts of the men’s movement, but also within evolutionary psychology. The core claim remains the same: humans are a fundamentally gynocentric species, and men simply need to accept it.

Feminists naturally embrace this 135-year-old narrative, and they have led the way in embedding it into the canon of modern ideas. From my observations, those most invested in a gynocentric lifestyle, whether men or women, are its strongest defenders today.

For anyone wanting to check the scientific veracity of biological-gynocentrism theories, I can think of no better corpus than that of Peter Ryan; a researcher educated in molecular biology who has debunked all of the usual “scientific” appeals to gynocentrism as amounting to pseudoscience. You can read his article on Ward’s gynocentrism theory here, and his entire series of articles here.

While human relationships and wider culture can indeed tilt in a gynocentric direction, this does not mean it is a necessary evolutionary norm. The intense gynocentrism we see today is better understood as maladaptive behaviour — the result of novel cultural forces exploiting our existing biological potentials.

This scenario is analogous to a cellphone interfering with an airplane’s systems. We switch phones to flight mode precisely because we don’t want corrupted signals or dangerous novel reactions. The plane is not programmed to perform spinning cartwheels, yet the existing systems can still be disrupted enough to produce that outcome. In the same way, the claim that gynocentrism is hardwired in us as a “natural instinct” is misleading. It is more accurately viewed as a set of corrupting cultural forces acting on our biology to generate pathological, maladaptive responses.

This problem has been succinctly summarized by Hannah Wallen’s concept of the ‘Natural Gynocentrism Fallacy,‘ which refers to the belief that sexually mature women are the most important unit within the human species due to the role they play in reproduction – ie. it is a belief in which women are assumed to be more valuable to human society, and to human relationships, than are men, children and even the perpetuation of one’s genes. A corollary assumption is that women’s lives and wants should be prioritized over those of men and children.

The natural gynocentrism fallacy, according to Wallen, involves a denial of the fact that all adult humans, including women, are child-centric, gene-centric, and utilitarian toward that end. Thus the hypothesis that humans are a ‘gynocentric species’ amounts to a denial of women’s evolutionary value as an instrument of the child’s creation and protection, i.e., not because her gender is valued per se outside this utilitarian function. Wallen summarizes that gynocentrism is not a naturally occurring phenomenon, is not inevitable, and is something that can be corrected. She states that historical gynocentric attitudes that have been treated as “natural,” and thus as the reason why gynocentrism could never be eliminated, are false.

With the knowledge that biological theories of gynocentrism originated with first-wave feminists, we should at least pause to re-examine the assumptions we’ve absorbed about humans being a naturally gynocentric species.

Regardless of which side of the debate we ultimately land on, it’s long past time to reject this longstanding feminist dogma and stop treating it as settled truth — whether in the sciences, where it has lingered for well over a century, or in the manosphere, where it has taken root over the last 15 years.

References:

[1] Ann Taylor Allen, Feminism, Social Science, and the Meanings of Modernity: The Debate on the Origin of the Family in Europe and the United States, 1860-1914

[2] Kimmel, M. S., & Mahler, M. (2007). Classical sociological theory. New York:: Oxford University Press

[3] Ward, L. F. Our Better Halves.

[4] Davis, C. (2010). Charlotte Perkins Gilman: A Biography. Stanford University Press.

[5] Gilman, C. P. (1911). The Man-Made World; or. Our Androcentric Culture.

[6] Gilman, C. P. (1911). Moving the Mountain. Charlton Company.

[7] Ward, L. F. (1903). Pure sociology: A treatise on the origin and spontaneous development of society. Macmillan Company.

SEE ALSO:  “Humans are a gynocentric species” is pure myth

Gynocentrism As A Narcissistic Pathology – Part 2

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The following paper was first published in July 2023 in New Male Studies Journal and is republished with permission.

_____________________________

NEW MALE STUDIES: AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL ~ ISSN 1839-7816 ~ Vol 12, Issue 1, 2023, Pp. 29–44 © 2023
AUSTRALIAN INSTITUTE OF MALE HEALTH AND STUDIES

Gynocentrism and female narcissism

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The following articles explore the role of narcissism in the context of gynocentric culture & behaviour. This emphasis is not aimed to reduce narcissism to an all-female pathology, but to demonstrate the ways in which female narcissism may lean toward gynocentric modes of expression, much as males demonstrate narcissism in typically gendered ways.

Formal studies in female narcissism by Ava Green (and colleagues) :

Articles on gynocentrism & narcissism by Peter Wright:

Articles on the narcissism ~ hypergamy conflation:

Research on interrelationship of narcissism and feminism:

Miscellaneous

Informal Articles

Narcissism Exaggerates Baseline Hypergamy

/ Peter Wright / 7 Comments

Many social media commentators discuss the rise of hypergamous behaviors among modern women.  Some pose reasonable evolutionary hypotheses for such behavior, but there may be another cause at work – cultural narcissism.

Observations of extreme hypergamy among women may be equally explained by the rise of cultural narcissism in affluent societies (Twenge & Campbell, 2009), a motive that differs from baseline hypergamy, but which nevertheless involves comparable behaviors of self-enhancement and status-seeking.

Society’s encouragement of men in chivalric deference to women, and the associated practice of ‘placing women on a pedestal’, has generated a degree of gendered narcissism among women over time. To frame this differently, Acquired Situational Narcissism can arise with any acquired social status; for example in academic experts, politicians, pop singers, actors – and also in women who, in modern society, are taught that they deserve to be recognised for thier worth, dignity, value, purity, status, reputation and esteem in the context of their relationships with men. This psychological disposition in women, partly a result of traditional chivalry, promotes exaggerated self-enhancement behaviours beyond what evolutionary models of hypergamy would require.

Among narcissistic individuals, studies find higher incidence of hypergamy-like behaviors, indicating that such behavior is not the result of a culture of sexual liberation alone, nor of baseline evolutionary imperatives; it may also be the result of an acquired social class narcissism that says “I deserve.”

Excerpts from narcissism studies:

A third strand of evidence concerns narcissists’ relationship choices. Because humans are a social species, relationship choices are an important feature of situation selection. Narcissists are more likely to choose relationships that elevate their status over relationships that cultivate affiliation. For example, narcissists are keener on gaining new partners than on establishing close relationships with existing ones (Wurst et al., 2017). They often demonstrate an increased preference for high-status friends (Jonason & Schmitt, 2012) and trophy partners (Campbell, 1999), perhaps because they can bask in the reflected glory of these people. In sum, narcissists are more likely to select social environments that allow them to display their performances publicly, ideally in competition with others. These settings are potentially more accepting and reinforcing of narcissistic status strivings.

Source: The “Why” and “How” of Narcissism: A Process Model of Narcissistic Status Pursuit1

Consistent with the self-orientation model, Study 5 provided an empirical demonstration of the mediational role of self enhancement in narcissists’ preference for perfect rather than caring romantic partners. Furthermore, these potential romantic partners were more likely to be seen as a source of self-esteem to the extent that they provided the narcissist with a sense of popularity and importance (i.e., social status). Narcissists’ preference for romantic partners reflects a strategy for interpersonal self-esteem regulation. Narcissists also were attracted to self-oriented romantic partners to the extent that these others were viewed as similar. The mediational roles of self-enhancement and similarity were independent. That is, narcissists’ romantic preferences were driven both by a desire to gain self-esteem and a desire to associate with similar others.

Source: Narcissism and romantic attraction2

Narcissism has been linked with the materialistic pursuit of wealth and symbols that convey high status (Kasser, 2002; Rose, 2007). This quest for status extends to relationship partners. Narcissists seek romantic partners who offer self- enhancement value either as sources of fawning admiration, or as human trophies (e.g., by possessing impressive wealth or exceptional physical beauty) (Campbell, 1999; Tanchotsrinon, Maneesri, & Campbell, 2007)

Source: The Handbook of Narcissism And Narcissistic Personality Disorders3

Narcissists are looking for partners who can provide them with self-esteem and status. How can a romantic partner provide status and esteem? First, he or she can do so directly: a romantic partner who admires me and thinks that I am wonderful elevates my esteem. Second, he or she can do so indirectly through a basic association: my partner is beautiful and popular, therefore I am too. This indirect esteem generation is clear from a range of social psychological research, from the self-evaluation maintenance (SEM) model (Tesser, 1988) to Basking in Reflected Glory (BIRGing; Cialdini et al., 1976). This indirect esteem provisioning is evident in the term “trophy” partner.

There is good empirical evidence that narcissists like targets who provide esteem and status both directly and indirectly (Campbell, 1999). There is also an important interaction effect. Namely, narcissists like popular and attractive partners, especially when those others admire them. Narcissists, however, are not particularly interested in admiration from just anybody. This finding is inconsistent with the “doormat hypothesis.” Narcissists are not looking for someone they can walk on and who worships them; rather, narcissists are looking for someone ideal who also admires them.

The next question, of course, is what characteristics of a potential partner make them able to provide narcissists with narcissistic esteem? Not surprisingly, what narcissists particularly look for in a partner are physical attractiveness and agentic traits (e.g., status and success). A narcissist’s ideal partner is like a narcissist’s ideal self (recall Freud’s comments): attractive, successful, and admiring of the narcissist. Indeed, in our research, narcissists report that part of the reason that they are drawn to attractive and successful partners is that these people are similar to them (Campbell, 1999).

Source: Campbell, W. K., Brunell, A. B., & Finkel, E. J. (2006). Narcissism, Interpersonal Self-Regulation, and Romantic Relationships: An Agency Model Approach.4

Dozens more quotations could be added, however the point is obvious: self-enhancement strategies of both narcissism and hypergamy share overlapping features.

The rise of narcissistic behaviors among women is receiving increased attention from academia, particularly with the addition of new variants to the lexicon such as communal narcissism, and vulnerable narcissism, which appear to be preferred female modes of expressing narcissism. A more in-depth survey of narcissism variants among women, and their implications can be read here.

Hypergamy, as an evolutionary motivation, doesn’t require a woman to overestimate her own attractiveness and desirability as she seeks to secure high resource/status males. Narcissism, on the contrary, does entail an overestimation by women of their own attractiveness & desirability as they seek to secure high resource/status males.

To discover whether hypergamy or narcissism is at play, one might simply ask a woman to rate her own attractiveness. If she strongly overrates herself, then her mating-up is likely driven by narcissism and is maladaptive. If she rates herself honestly, then her desire to mate up is more likely driven by an adaptive hypergamy. Mating-up today appears largely driven by maladaptive narcissism; therefore any rationalizing or excusing it as “natural” and “adaptive” serves to compound and increase that same culturally-driven narcissism.

A note on terminology:

Sigmund Freud introduced narcissism as a developmental trait that ranged from healthy to unhealthy.5,6 Some evolutionary psychologists posit that a degree of narcissism might be adaptive in the wider evolutionary sense, though this hypothesis (which has zero genetic evidence to confirm it) can only be applied to a limited subset of behaviours before tipping into maladaptive expressions of narcissism as measured by the usual psychometric instruments.7,8,9 Moreover, no one has satisfactorily demonstrated that a mild, non-pathological narcissism is adaptive and belongs to a construct continuum with more pathological narcissism; therefore it is conjecture to claim that narcissism is natural, but that it simply “gets out of hand” at the more extreme end of a hypothesised spectrum.

With these points in mind it’s necessary to differentiate between female self-enhancement as an evolutionary survival strategy, versus female self-enhancement as a maladaptive, narcissistic pathology. The narcissistic self-enhancement we see increasingly demonstrated among women today is not a contributor to evolutionary success; on the contrary it works to undermine family ties, corrode intimate relationships, and is also associated with lowering the birth rate – the exact opposites of conditions required for “adaptive.” Lastly, by differentiating hypergamous self-enhancement from narcissistic self-enhancement we avoid the error of encouraging or excusing narcissism under the banner of it being “natural.”

Maladaptive vs. adaptive versions of self-enhancement

 

REFERENCES:

[1] Grapsas, S., Brummelman, E., Back, M. D., & Denissen, J. J. (2020). The “why” and “how” of narcissism: A process model of narcissistic status pursuit. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 15(1), 150-172.
[2] Campbell, W. K. (1999). Narcissism and romantic attraction. Journal of Personality and social Psychology, 77(6), 1254.
[3] Wallace, H. M. (2011). Narcissistic self-enhancement. The handbook of narcissism and narcissistic personality disorder: Theoretical approaches, empirical findings, and treatments, 309-318.
[4] Campbell, W. K., Brunell, A. B., & Finkel, E. J. (2006). Narcissism, Interpersonal Self-Regulation, and Romantic Relationships: An Agency Model Approach.
[5] Freud, S. (2014). On narcissism: An introduction. Read Books Ltd.
[6] Segal, H., & Bell, D. (2018). The theory of narcissism in the work of Freud and Klein. In Freud’s On Narcissism (pp. 149-174). Routledge.
[7] Holtzman, N. S., & Donnellan, M. B. (2015). The roots of Narcissus: Old and new models of the evolution of narcissism. Evolutionary perspectives on social psychology, 479-489.
[8] Holtzman, N. S. (2018). Did narcissism evolve?. Handbook of Trait Narcissism: Key Advances, Research Methods, and Controversies, 173-181.
[9] Czarna, AZ, Wróbel, M., Folger, LF, Holtzman, NS, Raley, JR, & Foster, JD (2022). Narcissism and Narcissistic Personality Disorder: Evolutionary roots and emotional profiles. In TK Shackelford & L. Al-Shawaf (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Evolution and the Emotions. Oxford University Press.