Where did you read that? How did they put that together?
What does magical mean to you? Just that he is free to enjoy his disposable wealth or something? Anybody can do that.
The idea that power in tribal societies was based mainly on visible skills such as hunting or fighting is shaped by a patriarchal view and colonial attitudes. It often overlooks the nuances and variety in traditional sociopolitical structures. Many indigenous societies in North America and elsewhere historically included significant egalitarian or matrilineal elements, where women’s authority, community cohesion and roles in governance, resource management and ritual life were highly respected. In some cases, these elements were dominant.
Pre-colonial indigenous societies often valued balanced, reciprocal gender roles, and some were organised matrilineally, with property, lineage and authority passing through women rather than men. Women’s leadership was sometimes paramount in social, spiritual and economic spheres, contradicting the stereotype that only the power of warriors or hunters was respected. Social cohesion and community survival relied on cooperation and diverse contributions, such as herbal knowledge, food gathering, decision-making and peacemaking, rather than male-coded skills.
However, colonialism systematically undermined these systems by imposing patriarchal norms, Eurocentric laws and Christianity, which marginalised women’s traditional authority and redefined leadership and privilege in patriarchal terms. Colonial administrators deliberately promoted patriarchal governance, granting formal status and property rights predominantly to men and sidelining women, even when they had played a key role in stewarding resources or building tribal consensus.
Cultural expressions of women’s leadership and social cohesion were often ridiculed or suppressed as part of colonial strategies, contributing to the erasure of matrilineal and egalitarian traditions, and normalising patriarchal assumptions in both indigenous and outsider narratives. However, there is an increasing awareness, both within tribal communities and within scholarly circles, that the patriarchal assessment of power as ‘skill’ (in the sense of typically masculine skills) is neither universal nor an accurate single descriptor of tribal societies.
Can you give a specific occurrence of a traditional (whose tradition no longer exists, because supplanted) feminine authority redefined & marginalized by Christianity, and why you think that is a correct interpretation of Christianity?
The Christian doctrine practised by missionaries was rooted in biblical texts advocating male spiritual authority, such as Ephesians 5:23 and 1 Timothy 2:12. Missionaries applied these principles by actively reshaping indigenous societies to fit patriarchal gender roles.
One example of how traditional feminine authority was redefined and marginalised by Christianity can be seen in various indigenous Kenyan societies, where missionary conversion efforts dramatically altered women’s social and marital status. In pre-colonial Kenyan societies, women had defined roles within polygamous marriages and community leadership, playing an integral part in lineage, property rights and ritual life. However, when Christian missionaries insisted that all converts must be monogamous — a tenet aligned with Christian teaching — many co-wives were abandoned and left homeless as their marriages were no longer recognised within the new Christian order.
Beyond polygamy, a specific example is the Khasi community of Meghalaya, India, which traditionally practised a matrilineal system in which women held authority over lineage, inheritance and family property. However, with the arrival of Christian missionaries and British colonial rule, this long-standing tradition of women as custodians of property and household leadership was redefined to fit patriarchal Christian ideals. Christian conversion required Khasi families to adopt the ‘nuclear family’ structure and male spiritual leadership, which directly contradicted matrilineal customs. Church communities enforced male-dominated pastoral leadership and discouraged women from holding formal authority in religious or communal roles.
Instead, they preached biblical interpretations that prioritised male headship in both faith and society. Chiefs and other community leaders, who were once determined by maternal lineage, were increasingly appointed or recognised along patriarchal lines as Christianity became more influential.
Actually, you’re wrong. The Khasi People of Meghalaya: Where Women Rule - WorldAtlas
Do you have a better example?
If you search “Christianity impact Kenya women” through Bing it tells another story.
This one seems fair and balanced. Love the ban on female circumcision:
@Maxx Have I defeated Stirner? Asking ‘what is power?’ ‘how does Stirner define power’?’ seems a difficult question to answer.
Since you refuse to come to Stirner aid, let me ask AI .
how would Stirner define power?
ChatGPT zei:
Max Stirner, the 19th-century German philosopher best known for his work The Ego and Its Own (1844), doesn’t define “power” in a systematic or technical way like some later philosophers might, but the concept is central to his egoist philosophy.
In Stirner’s view, power is essentially:
The ability of the individual to assert and realize their will — their ownness (Eigenheit) — in the world.
Let’s unpack that based on Stirner’s ideas:
1. Power as Expression of the Ego
Stirner sees individuals (or “the Unique”) as inherently self-interested beings who should act according to their own desires and goals — not according to abstract ideals, moral duties, or collective demands. So for Stirner:
Power is what the ego uses to take possession of what it wants.
He writes:
“What I have in my power, that is my own. So long as I assert myself as holder, I am the proprietor of the thing.”
This shows that ownership, control, and use are rooted in actual power, not in abstract rights or laws.
2. Power vs. Fixed Ideas (Spooks)
Stirner is sharply critical of what he calls spooks — abstractions like State, Morality, Religion, Humanity — which people submit to and serve. These spooks disempower the individual by asking them to subordinate their will.
In contrast, real power lies in casting off those illusions and living according to one’s own will, not according to duties imposed by imaginary authorities.
3. Power is Practical, Not Moral
For Stirner, power is not a right or something granted by others. It’s something you take and exercise. There’s no morality involved — just ability.
“I am owner of my might, and I am so when I know myself as unique.”
So, you are powerful to the extent that you can actualize your will, regardless of what society or morality says about it.
Summary — Stirnerian Definition of Power
Power is the individual’s capacity to assert, possess, and enjoy what they desire — without subordination to external ideals, rules, or authorities.
It’s about might over right, action over permission, and individual will over collective illusions.
Okay, if this is generally correct, then it’s like I suggested. Power is the … power to get what you want. He doesn’t clarify the means. So, brute force? All other forms involve interactions, which come with burdensome, collectively upheld phenomena that he rejects and says are antithetical to power.
So be powerful means to live aside from society as it has existed at least for the past 8000 years - aside from humanity’s axiological systems - Stirnerian power can’t be obtained through commerce, which falls under moral rules, like ‘don’t steal or rob people’. So Stirnerian power is basically a guy in the wilderness taking care of himself and not encountering any society.
So it’s a very limited sort of power - it can’t involve any advanced technology, as that is produced under greater economies with all kinds of rules and authorities. Stirner ideal takes place before the agricultural revolution.
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/edit - I’ll see if I can find more about the Neahderthal theory.
As for magic, I’m sure you can derive what I mean from the post if you so desire. In fact I made a point to myself of implicitly giving a partial definition of magic by explicating in its terms an important context wherein it comes into play. It is not easily defined directly, because it is magical.
The formula “self=other”, if people collectively took it as law, would be such a magic, in the form of a metaphysical authority. In order to get to that magical position it would have to exert and create a lot of magic. That is the mystery of good philosophy and religion - when is it magical? When does it work to bind people to an influential transgenerational behavior? Being analytically absolutely correct neither sufficient nor necessary required.
One dream, one soul
One prize, one goal
One golden glance of what should be (it’s a kind of magic)
I can only afford to participate in this community two or three times a week, so I was not ignoring you, in fact I reopened this thread after months specifically to talk about this subject.
I will return to this topic next week. Unless death seizes me first.
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It’s quite simple, when the majority or at the very least half of a population becomes oppressed they rebel and seek out revolution together as a bunch of organized individuals. Out of the organization of revolting individuals emerges a single leader who then leads them.
For some reason your anarchist mind seems unable to grasp this. 
Even in the most primitive tribal communities the chief ruled over all and behind the chief was the shaman. Nowhere in the history of mankind is there ever a successful version of anarchy, it simply doesn’t exist.
The closest thing we can find to anarchy are rogue bandit territories which was very common in ancient eras, even then there was the king of thieves.
Have you seen the show Deadwood? It is a depiction of how an autonomous, relatively anarchic, self-organized settlement in South Dakota, where in the beginning Saloon owner loosely determines the limits in as far as there are any, becomes gradually subservient to order as the American state encroaches on it.
A sheriff arrives early on, but he has to contend with the natural order (the magic of whiskey and gold) and has to negotiate his powers with he Saloon owner. The real subservience to greater order comes to be as the Newspaperman, William Randolph Hearst (who said that the only truths printed in newspapers are the advertisements) arrives. It is very cynical and truthful in that sense.
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Yes, good example. I very much like westerns myself as well. @Jakob
There never really is any existence of anarchy whatsoever in the entirety of world history, there may be unexplored areas, unknown isolated territories, or even places in the world where there is a weakened authority and government that ushers in massive lawlessness, but beyond that there is never a place ever where no kind of ruling authority exists. There are different kinds of authority or governments, but never a place where they’re completely absent.
Hierarchies forms authority which then evolves into government everywhere around the world. I really wish anarchists could be more specific discussing anarchy because the way they discuss it everything quickly devolves into a sort of idealistic anarchist metaphysical mysticism that beyond their own heads has no real world applications whatsoever.
You can see why people long for their ideal though, and will keep longing. A friend wrote:
"Also one reason why I like the show Deadwood so much. It shows such a pure and clean society, free of politics. Violence in all its forms, balanced by common sense capitalist self-interest on one side and shared appeals and appreciation for authentically human decency on the other.
A society/group that needs no politics and no police, that simply self-regulates based on those above principles. What a beautiful thing. Dangerous yes, but fucking beautiful. What I would give to be alive for just a day back then, to ride into town on my horse, smell the dust and shit and various foods and campfires in the air. Sit down in a saloon, drink some whiskey, some earthy talk with the locals, maybe play some poker. Get a room later, pay for a nice whore and a bottle of whiskey to enjoy for the rest of the night. Wake up in the fresh morning air, walk around a bit, eat some bacon and eggs. Buy or barter for a new gun, maybe a new hat or boots. Feel the weight of the silver in my pocket. Lean up against a wooden post or sit down on a stoop and casually smoke a cigarette, enjoying the morning air.
A simple life, in the real world among real human beings. What a wonderful thing that could be."
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Many years ago I too was an anarchist, a young man full of the romanticism of total freedom. I understand what anarchists desire very much, but in the end it is pure fiction or fantasy. It’s almost a kind of political escapism but supposedly absent of all politics. Supposedly…
I think people strive for anarchism because they can’t imagine a possibility where a government actually cares for its people or tries to create an environment where all the needs of people are met. To that I would tell people to study the history of world government systems, for me now in the present not being the young man I once was the answer lies somewhere in there. We have the ability to create a kind of government leadership and organization that can create the kind of decency human beings rightfully deserve.
The word whore ruins the entire thing. Men are freaking idiots.
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The fact that matrilineal customs persist among the Khasi, Garo and Jaintia tribes of Meghalaya does not mean that Christianity and colonialism did not attempt to change or disrupt these traditions. The evidence quoted below shows that, although these matrilineal structures were not completely dismantled, they were significantly transformed and undermined by colonial and missionary influences.
You can read there how, in the Khasi Hills, Christian missionaries promoted the nuclear family with male spiritual authority, encouraged male converts to assume traditional leadership roles and discouraged women from holding influential positions in the church or wider community.
Colonial administrators and Christian missions imposed legal and institutional frameworks favouring patrilineal norms, sometimes reinterpreting or bypassing indigenous matrilineal laws regarding property and inheritance. Conversion to Christianity often depended on adopting new family ideologies based on biblical patriarchal values, which contrasted sharply with Khasi matrilineal customs.
Attempts were made by Christianity (and colonialism) to redefine and undermine traditional feminine authorities and matrilineal structures in Meghalaya, but they were only partially successful. The core of the tradition survived, albeit altered, due to indigenous resistance and adaptation.
I haven’t read your link, and barely scanned your text, but … you haven’t answered the second part of my question. [Side thought: I bet the Christians put a stop to all the males in a tribe having sex with a female before she was married. Good for her. In doing a little bit of research on this topic, I found out a lot more that I did not want to know. Those tribes need Jesus.]
Why do you think that is the correct interpretation of Christianity? Jesus was very countercultural in a very patriarchal culture. Worth noting. But allowing men to do what they were obviously sculpted to do is for women, not against women.
I agree that Kenya cannot be characterised as a place where colonialism completely stripped women of their autonomy. The reality is more complex, marked by both oppression and resistance.
Female circumcision in Kenya originated as a cultural rite of passage and a symbol of ethnic identity, associated with beliefs about maturity, marriage and social acceptance. However, colonial and missionary opposition later imbued the practice with political symbolism and reactivity. Opposition from missionaries and the British government was perceived by some Kenyan communities as an assault on tradition and autonomy, thereby reinforcing its social significance.
Female genital mutilation (FGM) is a complex practice that is deeply embedded in the social norms and traditions of patriarchal societies. It is often performed and upheld by women themselves, including mothers and older women.
However, portraying FGM as a means of preventing ‘unwanted births’ or promoting female chastity is part of a systemic shift in blame that places responsibility on women, reinforcing their subjugation while largely leaving male accountability unexamined, despite the reality of rape and coercion in many societies.
Kenya provides a nuanced case study for considering colonialism’s impact on women’s autonomy. While colonialism, especially British rule, imposed patriarchal systems and caused significant disruption to women’s traditional authority, particularly concerning land rights, access to education, and social roles, it also presented opportunities for women to exercise agency and leadership, particularly during resistance movements such as the Mau Mau rebellion.
The Mau Mau uprising challenged traditional gender roles, allowing women to assume leadership and combat roles and assert their political agency in new and transformative ways. Women also developed novel social networks and took on responsibilities, demonstrating their resilience and adaptability within the colonial context, challenging their marginalisation.