Re: the connotations of “status”—for my part, I care more about having some label for the thing we’re talking about than I care what the label is.
Do you have a preferred term?
In some contexts one can talk about “rank,” or “privilege,” or “juice,” or “clout,” or even “wealth,” but I find them all too specialized for general use. I use “status” precisely because it can apply just as readily to high-school students trying to avoid ostracism as prison inmates trying to avoid assault as poverty-stricken peasants trying to avoid starvation, which is useful when trying to talk about the thing they all have in common.
“Kyriarchal advantage” is a bit of a mouthful, but it might be useful, especially if you want to differentiate between status that’s granted as a result of being in a particular reference class vs. status that has been personally earned.
Yep, basically that—any system where certain people intrinsically have more status/power than others is kyriarchal. Notably, most activism communities are still just as kyriarchal as mainstream society, except with regards to the specific issue that they’re doing activism about. (Some of them are even kyriarchal with regards to their own issue—notably disability activism, where many activists focus on getting more power for people in situations like their own without much concern for other kinds of disabilities.)
I thought about it, and unfortunately I can’t think of a good, widely-known alternative, although as far as neologisms go, I find this “Kyriarchial advantage” rather appealing.
Re: the connotations of “status”—for my part, I care more about having some label for the thing we’re talking about than I care what the label is.
Do you have a preferred term?
In some contexts one can talk about “rank,” or “privilege,” or “juice,” or “clout,” or even “wealth,” but I find them all too specialized for general use. I use “status” precisely because it can apply just as readily to high-school students trying to avoid ostracism as prison inmates trying to avoid assault as poverty-stricken peasants trying to avoid starvation, which is useful when trying to talk about the thing they all have in common.
“Kyriarchal advantage” is a bit of a mouthful, but it might be useful, especially if you want to differentiate between status that’s granted as a result of being in a particular reference class vs. status that has been personally earned.
Thank you for that post. I’m not sure what “Kyriarchal” is supposed to mean, but the article made a lot of sense and shows how complicated it is.
Well, “Kyrie” is generally translated as “Lord,” so a kyriarchal system is presumably one which is ruled by the people who rule it.
Yep, basically that—any system where certain people intrinsically have more status/power than others is kyriarchal. Notably, most activism communities are still just as kyriarchal as mainstream society, except with regards to the specific issue that they’re doing activism about. (Some of them are even kyriarchal with regards to their own issue—notably disability activism, where many activists focus on getting more power for people in situations like their own without much concern for other kinds of disabilities.)
Glad it’s appreciated. I’ve been waiting for an opportunity to pull that out. ^.^
I thought about it, and unfortunately I can’t think of a good, widely-known alternative, although as far as neologisms go, I find this “Kyriarchial advantage” rather appealing.