Fascinating article drawing on first-hand experience. The only other matriarchal society that I was aware of also lived in the Indian Ocean; the Ilois people, a self-sufficient community who had lived for several centuries on the Chagos Archipelago. The Chagos was considered to be part of Mauritius, which was a British colony until it proclaimed its independence in 1968. Prior to that a lot of shenanigans occurred wherein Britain illegally gave the United States the Chagos in exchanged for a small debt, and the 2,000 inhabitants were forcibly removed from the island home and treated extremely shabbily, in order for America to construct its Diego Garcia military base on the Ilois' island home..
One has to come to terms with the modern world. You can't make it all stop. The Marshallese can't make their traditional land rights courts work. They are interminable and simply don't resolve anything. Fighting is what made the land rights system work in the past. It is still respected, but utterly unsuited for today. I don't keep up on the changes, but clear title to land can now be bought and sold, with Marshallese caveats, in the Marshall Islands.
The Marshallese are no more content with poverty than the next guy. Poverty is most easily borne when you don't realize you are poor. Everybody was pretty poor when I lived in the Marshalls. The contentment came from not knowing any better. East, west, home is best. As long as home stays recognizable, people are content liking what they know.
The rule of law is the key. Law unlocks the doors to liberty because it secures us in our property. Fighting over land and women is great sport I suppose, but there is no security in it. The old missionaries said the biggest change Christianity brought to the Islanders was the cessation of fear. The constant nagging fear that the spirits have to be appeased - and are not appeased. The manipulation of the spiritual powers that enliven everything on land and sea and sky and inhabit all flesh and blood. The fear of magic. The fear that you don't have the right magic to block the evil magic. The fear of the juju man.
The rule of law is impossible without it's precursor - the divine law - the law has to originate outside of ourselves. Law fails if it is just men devising contrivances to masquerade as law. If law isn't from God then law is just about power. Law becomes a contrivance to defraud and oppress. Call it gift of the white man. It's really the gift of God.
The Ilois people were finally rounded up and taken off their homeland on a British Destroyer, transported to Mauritius where they were deposited on the harbour and left to fend for themselves. They have since won a High Court case which ruled that they had been illegally dispossessed of their island, but the wrangling and shenanigans still goes on. Although it the British who performed the illegal act, the United States presumably had sussed that the island was inhabited, so was indirectly responsible for egging the Brits on.
I'm pleased to hear that the Marshallese are contented, and it was a noble and dynamic decision of yourself and your wife to have opened your household and shared your family life with your adopted Marshallese daughter. Ironically, I imagine that she can probably teach us Westerners more valuable lessons than we might be able to teach her. Were matriarchy to have prevailed in the West, the Ilois folk would still be doing their own thing on the Chagos Archipelago.
Interesting read! And, yes, head girls. . . . Not good. I think I’d have liked your mom a lot.
Fascinating article drawing on first-hand experience. The only other matriarchal society that I was aware of also lived in the Indian Ocean; the Ilois people, a self-sufficient community who had lived for several centuries on the Chagos Archipelago. The Chagos was considered to be part of Mauritius, which was a British colony until it proclaimed its independence in 1968. Prior to that a lot of shenanigans occurred wherein Britain illegally gave the United States the Chagos in exchanged for a small debt, and the 2,000 inhabitants were forcibly removed from the island home and treated extremely shabbily, in order for America to construct its Diego Garcia military base on the Ilois' island home..
One has to come to terms with the modern world. You can't make it all stop. The Marshallese can't make their traditional land rights courts work. They are interminable and simply don't resolve anything. Fighting is what made the land rights system work in the past. It is still respected, but utterly unsuited for today. I don't keep up on the changes, but clear title to land can now be bought and sold, with Marshallese caveats, in the Marshall Islands.
The Marshallese are no more content with poverty than the next guy. Poverty is most easily borne when you don't realize you are poor. Everybody was pretty poor when I lived in the Marshalls. The contentment came from not knowing any better. East, west, home is best. As long as home stays recognizable, people are content liking what they know.
The rule of law is the key. Law unlocks the doors to liberty because it secures us in our property. Fighting over land and women is great sport I suppose, but there is no security in it. The old missionaries said the biggest change Christianity brought to the Islanders was the cessation of fear. The constant nagging fear that the spirits have to be appeased - and are not appeased. The manipulation of the spiritual powers that enliven everything on land and sea and sky and inhabit all flesh and blood. The fear of magic. The fear that you don't have the right magic to block the evil magic. The fear of the juju man.
The rule of law is impossible without it's precursor - the divine law - the law has to originate outside of ourselves. Law fails if it is just men devising contrivances to masquerade as law. If law isn't from God then law is just about power. Law becomes a contrivance to defraud and oppress. Call it gift of the white man. It's really the gift of God.
The Ilois people were finally rounded up and taken off their homeland on a British Destroyer, transported to Mauritius where they were deposited on the harbour and left to fend for themselves. They have since won a High Court case which ruled that they had been illegally dispossessed of their island, but the wrangling and shenanigans still goes on. Although it the British who performed the illegal act, the United States presumably had sussed that the island was inhabited, so was indirectly responsible for egging the Brits on.
I'm pleased to hear that the Marshallese are contented, and it was a noble and dynamic decision of yourself and your wife to have opened your household and shared your family life with your adopted Marshallese daughter. Ironically, I imagine that she can probably teach us Westerners more valuable lessons than we might be able to teach her. Were matriarchy to have prevailed in the West, the Ilois folk would still be doing their own thing on the Chagos Archipelago.