Online Reporter
Alice Tagwira
At its core, patriarchy is not merely a social preference for men; it is a sophisticated, structural system designed to invalidate and undervalue women. It is a form of sexism that functions as a political identity, dictating that a woman’s primary utility is to be a wife and a mother—a “follower” by divine or natural decree. It tells women they lack the cognitive furniture for high-level logic while simultaneously demanding they perform the most complex emotional and logistical labor on the planet. Patriarchy is the theft of the self, repackaged as “destiny.”
THE COLONIAL MIRROR
Patriarchy is the elder sibling of colonialism. Their behaviors are identical, sharing a DNA of domination. Just as colonial powers invaded lands, erased indigenous identities, and declared the inhabitants “subjects” for their own “protection,” patriarchy invades the female psyche.
Identity Erasure: Colonialism changed names; patriarchy changes surnames and identities to reflect ownership.
The “Civilizing” Lie: Colonizers claimed they brought “order” to the “savage”; patriarchs claim they provide “leadership” to the “emotional.”
Resource Theft: Both systems view the “other” as a mine to be stripped. Whether it is gold from the earth or labor from a womb, the goal is extraction without compensation.
THE ECONOMIC NEXUS
Capitalism is the engine, but patriarchy is the fuel. Feminist economists like Silvia Federici have long argued that capitalism would collapse if it actually had to pay for “social reproduction”—the cooking, cleaning, and emotional regulation that keeps the workforce functional.
Women act as the global economy’s unpaid infrastructure. They subsidize men’s ambitions and stabilize their failures. From a cold, capitalistic cost-benefit analysis, investing your life’s energy into a traditional man is a financially illiterate decision. Yet, the system survives because it trains women to prioritize “being chosen” over being secure. It creates a “fear of being unchosen” that functions as a psychological tax, forcing women to over-give to manage their own induced anxiety.
THE “SMALL KINGDOM” OF THE EMASCULATED
In the African context, the intersection of capitalism and patriarchy takes on a specific, jagged edge. As global economic shifts make it harder for young men to attain wealth or status in the “outside” world, the traditional marriage is marketed as a consolation prize.
If a man cannot be a king in the boardroom, patriarchy promises him a “small kingdom” at home where he can be the “Head of House.” This is why we see a desperate push for younger, inexperienced women who are perceived as easier to control. In many African societies, this manifests as a fear of female financial independence. The man who is “afraid of a woman with her own money” knows instinctively that his authority rests not on his merit, but on her lack of options. Who feeds you, controls you.
THE WAR MACHINE
Men start fires, blame women, and call it “leadership.” History is a ledger of wars started by men, profited from by men, and gatekept by men. In Sudan, this reaches its most horrific logical conclusion. The conflict is not just a political struggle; it is an economic war of destabilization.
Strategic sexual violence in Sudan is used as a tool of displacement and humiliation—a patriarchal tactic to break the spirit of communities. While men in uniforms negotiate power and weapons contracts, Sudanese women are the ones fleeing with children and burying the dead. They didn’t draw the borders or sign the arms deals, yet they carry the weight of a nation’s collapse. Women don’t “stay out” of war; they are the primary targets of its most brutal extraction.
THE HOLY SLAVERY
Oh! How I can’t spare religion! Why? Because it provides the moral scaffolding for this exploitation. It does not teach women partnership; it teaches obedience management. The term “helpmate” is frequently weaponized as a divine job description for unpaid labor, sexual availability, and emotional regulation—all wrapped in the guise of “virtue.”
Feminist theologians like Mary Daly and Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza argue that religious narratives sanctify female suffering. If a woman is unfulfilled, she is told she is being “refined.” This conditioning makes it impossible for many to distinguish between love and martyrdom. Their nervous systems are trained to associate their own depletion with spiritual goodness, ensuring they remain silent while they are exploited.
THE TRAINING GROUND
This system does not persist by accident. It is transmitted in the home, often by mothers who survived by self-erasure and now call it wisdom. These mothers raise daughters not to be free, but to be “acceptable.” They normalize male disrespect, spiritualize female endurance, and call boundaries “pride.”
As bell hooks warned, these women are not protecting their daughters; they are grooming them for harm. When a daughter eventually sacrifices her own well-being for a man, she is simply applying the lesson her mother taught her: Women are replaceable; loyalty flows upward.
Beneath the glossy veneer of modern progress lies an ancient, grinding machinery. It is a dual-engine system where patriarchy provides the social blueprint and capitalism provides the economic incentive. Together, they form a pincer maneuver designed to ensure that women remain the world’s ultimate “shock absorbers”—unpaid, undervalued, and perpetually exhausted. This structure relies on a cycle of extraction where the feminine is the resource, and the masculine is the consumer, leaving behind a trail of psychological and economic depletion that spans generations.
Peter Tanyanyiwa