Another scripture featuring patriarchy

The "other" is referencing an earlier post about James 1:27.

Realistically, there are many, many scriptures that have patriarchy behind them. Since I have been writing about dominator culture and chastity, I have been thinking about Moroni 9:9-10:

And notwithstanding this great abomination of the Lamanites, it doth not exceed that of our people in Moriantum. For behold, many of the daughters of the Lamanites have they taken prisoners; and after depriving them of that which was most dear and precious above all things, which is chastity and virtue—

And after they had done this thing, they did murder them in a most cruel manner, torturing their bodies even unto death; and after they have done this, they devour their flesh like unto wild beasts, because of the hardness of their hearts; and they do it for a token of bravery.

Prisoners of war are being raped, murdered, and eaten; that is awful and disgusting and evil.

I will allow that the fact that the woman were raped is a sign that the patriarchy was already there; rape is a way that you dominate women.

I think there are some other things about it that are being perceived incorrectly. Without casting any blame -- Mormon and Moroni were good people in difficult times -- we can do better.

I am also not going to lower the value of chastity and virtue; those are important.

What I will argue is that if chaste and virtuous people of any gender are raped, that has not made them any less chaste or virtuous. That is a matter of what you do, not what others do to you.

It is devastating to have someone do something to your body that you do not want. There are terrible feelings of helplessness and betrayal and maybe worthlessness for not being able to stop it.

Those would be similar feelings to what a male rape victim would go through. The difference is that then the judgment would be about their manliness and if they really wanted it and if maybe they are gay, all of which is rotten.

What I am saying is that the real crime of rape is the assault on bodily autonomy. Our thinking about it is gendered in a way that is not merely not helpful but actually harmful.

Remember one of the things that made Elizabeth Smart's ordeal was hard was the analogy she had been taught about chewed up gum, and nobody wanting that.

I have read a few stories about young LDS women who were raped. Although they had been saving themselves for marriage, they later went through stages of promiscuity. I thought part of it was trying to exercise some choice and control, even if it was through choices they wouldn't have made before. I suspect now that a feeling of being "ruined" was also part of it. Why bother anymore, now that it is too late?

That kind of thinking is the fault of patriarchy, and it is a feature, not a bug.

It's patriarchy that says that women are property of men, and subservient. It can come out as sadism or that they should have the right or that the woman really wanted it or that what she wants doesn't matter, but it is that supremacy and dominion that is the essence of dominator culture.