Welcome to the Matriarchy--Brought to You By Hera
Charlize Theron as the Evil Queen in Snow White and the Huntsman
There’s been a shift in the framing of society’s ills. I’m sure it’s been going on for at least a decade, but since the pandemic, this change of public discourse has become more obvious. For a few years now, I’ve sensed something is different in the way the news and media reports the state of the world, but I couldn’t put a finger on it. As I was driving across the United States from California to Chicago a few weeks ago, it dawned on me what this change was—we’ve gone from accusation to blame. No longer are issues framed as the good guy vs. the bad guy, rather now the discourse is focused on the victim—various groups of people in need of retribution from a more nebulous foe. In the past, we’d name that foe with clarity: Muslims, Nazis, the Axis of Evil, rock-and-roll, drugs. The focus was on the bad people or influences, and how to eradicate them. Those of us against the bad guy were obviously good. It was basic and made organizing forces against the perceived evil quite simple. There is a bad guy, like Osama Bin Laden, and we bomb him. Or we label cigarettes with a warning about their dangers or rap music with Explicit Lyrics.
Nowadays, the message is one of shame and blame. You are the victim of some wrong, you can’t help it, and as a result, some sort of societal benefit has been withheld from you. This framing of society’s failings is deeper and more nuanced than the good vs. evil narrative. The bad guy now is patriarchy as a whole, or colonialism, whose sins were perpetrated for centuries before you, the victim, were born but that still haunt you and keep you from the glory that supposedly life owes to each of us. Patriarchy was at first white men, but then it became all men, and all religion, and now math, physics, or anything rational really, was added to the list of things holding us back, as well as women who still appreciate law and order, science, and logic. At the center of this worldview is safety as the highest form of love and respect—keeping your body safe and most importantly, your emotions safe. That anyone might harm your feelings is illegal. Laws are passed to create safe spaces, safe speech, safe playgrounds, safe households.
As I drove across our beautiful nation earlier this month, I pondered this change, this shift in our consciousness, turning the reality over and over within my mind and about the time I crossed into the stunning vistas of Utah, I realized that maybe, just maybe, the patriarchy has finally been defeated and a matriarchy has taken its place. On one hand, this has been the goal all the long—the petty tyrant has had his day and while the law and order that the strongman ensures is a benefit to civilization, the good guy vs. the bad guy story was limiting. There is nuance in the world and understanding that we live in a web of life, rather than hold the narrow view that we all stand on one side or the other of a line down the middle of a football field, is the next step for humanity.
However, the matriarch who won the battle is none other than the devouring mother—and she ain’t easy to live with.
Since Beyonce’s “Run the World (Girls)” single was released in 2011, I’ve seen t-shirts, hats, bumper stickers etc. declaring the future is female. Well, if this is true, I’d like to take a moment to present a few other female archetypes for consideration, for if we continue down the road of the devouring mother, we run the risk of focusing all our resources on how bad we’ve been treated to the detriment of building what is needed to run civilization. The devouring mother cares less for law and order, clean streets or running water, than she does for controlling her children and the world around them. The devouring mother will dote upon you, keeping you in an infantile state of dependence up on her, until you show your independence, at which point she will use shame and blame to get you back into line. If that doesn’t work, she will move to destroy you. Those are her only two options—devour or destroy.
Sounds a little like the ex-husband she’s claimed to have dethroned, doesn’t it? Only her playbook is less obvious and in some ways, hurts a lot more.
GODDESSES OF OLD
Back in my twenties, I read The Goddesses in Everywoman by Jungian psychologist, Jean Shinoda Bolen. I realize we’re in the age of genderlessness, however as a storyteller, I live for the archetypes. These are ancient forms that all the religions of old built their stories upon. It’s why many myths and legends have lived on longer than any political movement. Deep within us live these archetypes to various degrees. What most “enlightened” masters teach is that the way to freedom is to balance these archetypes both within and without us. We can understand the politics of the world through our understanding of the types of people and forces at play.
Some of the best archetypes were on display within the Greek pantheon. Most of us have studied this collection of characters, or read Percy Jackson to our kids, but for ease of this discussion, I’ll lay them out for you. On the “male” side, we had Zeus, the sky god king in charge of everything, his brothers Poseidon (God of the sea) and Hades (God of the underworld), plus Aries (God of war), Apollo (God of music and science), Hephaestus (God of fire and building), and in the end, Dionysus (God of pleasure and wine). Note that there are seven gods here total, but in the beginning, there were six. Later, the goddess Hestia (fire and hearth) was kicked out to make room for Dionysus and his debauchery, but more on that in a moment.
On the “female” side we have Hera, Zeus’s bride, Demeter (Goddess of grain and family), Athena (Goddess of logic and reason), Artemis (Goddess of the forest and hunting), Aphrodite (Goddess of love), and Hestia (Goddess of the hearth), the one we lost to wine. In all of the stories, the gods and goddesses created drama for the humans around them, as well as themselves. This was not a religion of pious deities, rather it was one of tension, play, and epic sagas. For the most part, the gods and goddesses worked both together and against each other to create the stage for human evolution, but it was obvious that Zeus was the one in charge, often at war with his brothers. Your typical tyrant of old, he is the face of the patriarchy—an old man in the sky ready to cast down judgement in the forms of lighting and destruction, or else he’d send in Aries to start a war. In those moments where he wasn’t punishing mankind for existing, he was screwing, a lot, which bothered his wife, Hera, a lot.
Hera is the least appealing of the goddesses. Her story is one of servitude to a man who never loved her yet needed her to hold the throne. Most of the myths about Hera involve her punishing Zeus’s lovers and the children created in his unions. She’s a jealous queen, an angry and controlling mother, and a hater of all children but her own. She doesn’t trust the other goddesses, disdains all women more beautiful and talented than herself, and in the end, spends most of her days plotting how to either devour or destroy.
Sound familiar?
Women have been struggling to create the matriarchy my entire life. I was born in 1972, the year Roe v. Wade was passed. I’ve been the recipient of many blessings as a woman in this age, watching Hera send blow after blow toward Zeus. It’s been a remarkable movement yet something inside of me has always been afraid of Hera. Her anger is justified, her desire to divorce Zeus is crucially important for the evolution of our world, and yet Hera’s plight is not the only thing women have to offer. There are five other goddess archetypes that could have been the one to win here. For while it’s true that Zeus has been dethroned, now lying in a ditch, drunk out of his mind and unable to figure out what his next steps are, Hera’s rule isn’t one of equality, love, and interdependence. Hera requires us to depend entirely on her embrace, her devotion, and her attention. She’s not above using Aries to destroy as she sees fit, yet she lacks the executive planning of Zeus. In her hands, the god of war is restless, unable to focus on the “bad” guy. Instead, he’s ashamed of his existence, because Hera tells him he’s a bad boy on a daily basis, even though she needs him for protection. It’s a mixed message. Aries now stands in the road, next to the ditch where Zeus lay, unsure of his loyalties. Does he protect Hera from Zeus, or does he hold out his hand and resurrect the petty tyrant? It’s a lose-lose for Aries, and his anger is building. Can’t you feel it? Aries knows Hera is jealous of any sign of independence and in the end, no more enlightened than her ex-husband.
Let’s take a moment to consider what other forms the matriarchy could take…
If Demeter had been the one to dethrone Zeus, the focus would be on food and shelter. Demeter, the goddess of grain, is the one responsible for the agrarian revolution. She cast her spell upon humanity and drew us from our roving nature into the confines of her fields, teaching us how to grow and harvest grain. It is for this reason, many anthropologists believe that early agricultural societies were matriarchies, for while we’ve always followed the seasons as a guide for our livelihoods, once we settled to grow our own food, we created an intimate relationship with nature that necessitated a deeper observation of the landscapes around us. We also learned how to build during this time, bonding with gods of carpentry and stone. Demeter controls the seasons, the rains, the sun, and the bounty. In a matriarchy based on Demeter, no one would go hungry, all would be sheltered, and farming would be the most revered profession, with homemaking and homebuilding close seconds. Civilization was built upon fields, architecture, and the hearth. A modern example of Demeter would be the work of Vandana Shiva and her quest to free agriculture from the bonds of Monsanto and the like.
Or why not try an Aphrodite culture, one of love. Many see love as frivolous, something important but impossible to base a society upon. However, the goddess of love is the one who inspires the creator and tempers the warrior. Aphrodite was married to Hephaestus, the least physically attractive of the gods but the one in charge of building civilization. He ran the forges of Olympus, and without his skill, there would be no pyramids, pillars, or skyscrapers and his muse is love. However, being the goddess of love, Aphrodite can love more than one man and Aries is her boyfriend of choice. Through her love, the God of war is tempered. While Hera hates him for his strength and for the fact she needs him, Aphrodite loves him for his power and understands his innate need to protect. Through her love, Aries is balanced, ennobled, and able to see when the requests of his masters are irrational. It is love that ensures Zeus never rises to power again, and it is love that unties the opposing powers.
There is a biblical legend that in the beginning of time, Lucifer and Sophia were the highest of angels, nearly indistinguishable, twin flames, so to speak. Both were considered the morning star that rose above the earth. Then God made humanity, and the star, the beloved of the divine, split in two—Lucifer disdaining God’s people while Sophia delighted in them. To this day, the sarcasm and cynicism of people like Jon Stewart, Tucker Carlson, Matt Walsh, and social media users as a whole are Luciferic impulses set to destroy us, even if those speaking think they’re truth tellers freeing us from fascism. It’s the message of the 2008 Barack Obama, or Charles Eisenstein, or Marianne Williamson’s book, The Politics of Love that would reign in an Aphrodite world. The challenge of the now is to chose delight over disdain, and a matriarchy built on Aphrodite is a place to start.
Perhaps we’re still not ready for love, shelter, and food for all, yet there are three more goddesses we could model our world upon—called the virgins for a reason. Not because they are without a mate, but because they are whole within themselves. Artemis, the Goddess of the hunt and the forest, understands the web of life and the intimate relationship between the planet and her people. An Artemis world would live in synchrony with the planet and show reverence to all creatures great and small. She also understands we must be able to protect ourselves—her skill with the bow rivals anything Aries can bring to the table. This is the heart of the ecological movement, and it is again about love. We can’t scare people into caring about the environment, but through our love of a forest, a lake, a mountain, a grove, we can inspire others to see the planet as our mother and not a resource to drain to our heart’s content.
The Athena’s of the world see patterns. They understand the need for law and order and work beside Aries and the others to get this done. Athena won’t gush and applaud your every action, not because she doesn’t see your accomplishments, but rather because she expects you to succeed. Hard work is necessary because life is work. There’s no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the joy comes from building the highways below the rainbow and appreciating the skill it takes to do so. She too can manage a war, and she can also manage a boardroom, yet her method is one of logic. In an Athena world, destroying an ecosystem in order to raise the value of your stock wouldn’t make sense, nor would overthrowing a stable foreign government in order to maintain access to an oil field, because the perfect mind that she represents sees the connections and patterns in the world, and bases her decisions on the long game, not short-term profits. Money isn’t the meaning of life, it is the means to an end, and the end must have an elegance and reason that sustains civilization, rather than destroy it.
The last matriarch is Hestia, Goddess of the hearth. She is different than the homemaker, for Hestia is silent. She has no need to speak for it is her intention that holds the world together. Hestia is fire, she keeps us warm, primed for action, yet she destroys when things are out of control. This is a strange goddess, but civilizations of old understood the need for this person in their world. A Hestia matriarchy isn’t the goal; rather, a successful society honors Hestia and provides a place for her. These are your shamans, nuns, monks—those who dedicate their lives to prayer and contemplation. It may seem strange that we need such a role, but there’s a reason cultures used to have a monastery in every town, or men and women who lived in the deserts, forests, and canyons, cloistered and in prayer, or the shaman/witch/Baba Yaga who lived alone in the forest but close enough that you could seek them out for counsel. These contemplatives needed silence to understand what was required of the village/clan/tribe/city. They were advisors, medicine people, and in some cases, they held the troubles of the world within their prayer. When we stopped supporting this role in our world, when we threw Hestia out of the pantheon to make room for Dionysus and all the thrills he promised, we cut ourselves from the web of life, from the divine, and from our very essence—our fire.
GODDESSES OF NOW
The intention here isn’t to say one archetype is better than the other. A truly balanced society would take in all aspects of male and female archetypes and create a world where we thrive rather than merely survive. It’s the centuries of worship of the Zeus-like leader that has kept us in a state of perpetual suicide, for that is what we are doing—war and ecological destruction at an ever-increasing rate is killing us as a species. Zeus absolutely needed to be stopped, and perhaps Hera was the only one who could do it. She’s strong and ancient and knows exactly how to strike him where it hurts. Yet Hera is one-sided and by no means complete on her own. Adding in Demeter’s domesticity, Aphrodite’s flirtatiousness and delight, Artemis’s focus and love of nature, Athena’s intellect and planning capabilities, and Hestia’s quite prayer would create the matriarchy we all long for.
Better yet, the balance of these feminine archetypes will inspire the male archetypes as well, giving Aries and Hephaestus purpose once again as well as allowing room for the music and literature of Apollo, the power and creative force of Poseidon’s Sea, as well as the respect and honor of the dead under Hade’s rule. Oh, and of course, the party-like atmosphere of Dionysus, without the over-intoxication we see today.
We are all these archetypes and more, and balancing our own thoughts and actions is the place to start. Seeking out the whole pantheon is the way forward, rather than continuing to be victims of Zeus and Hera fighting for control. Their divorce is final, the papers have been signed, and they’re not getting back together. It’s time to get over it and move into something else, something we all long for. Dare I say, the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible?