A World Without Fathers and Husbands
March 17th, 2009What if our society didn’t value the idea of a family consisting of a father, mother and children? What if marriage of a man and a woman didn’t exist? What if children didn’t bond with their fathers?
There are many studies that cite that children grow up healthier in a family where there is a mother and a father. These studies however, compare “traditional” families to “broken” families. These studies are still comparing family structure of accepted Western society. Using these studies, many cite the high rate of divorce, children born out of wedlock, the lack of paternal rights.
In Yongning, China, in the foothills of the Himalayas is a culture of people called the Moso. The Moso people are a matriarchal and matrilineal society. This means that women are the head of households and inheritance passes through the mother’s family. The Moso has no word for “father” because there is no Western equivalent of marriage. The family unit consists only of blood related family members related by mothers. Most families are made up of somewhere around 9 to 11 family members consisting of mothers, daughters, sons, cousins – all related by blood.
So where are the fathers? Moso women are often described as “free loving” people. It is not however, the same type of “free love” we as Westerners think of in the 1960s and 70s. Moso women are allowed to have more than one suitor and are allowed to have children with more than one man. They are not a promiscuous culture. On the contrary, courtship rituals are quite elaborate and difficult. A man wishing to court a woman needs the permission of both families. When a “couple” does come together, the man comes at night to have relations with the woman and before dawn, the man leaves. The man has duties to his mother’s family and the woman has duties to her mother’s family. They never live together and their children are raised by the mother and stays with the mother’s family. The “father” has limited responsibilities to the child.
This concept of a family is taboo in our society. The Moso culture was recently featured on an episode of National Geographic: Taboo. However, the Moso people have no concept of divorce, child custody and paternity. The mother’s family is always responsible for the well-being of any child. The entire family helps to raise that child whether you’re the child’s cousin, aunt, sibling or grandmother. When couples no longer see each other, there is no need for a formal divorce process. There’s no division of assets or property because land is passed down from the mother’s side of the family. This type of family structure, as strange as it might look to us, solves all the issues that our Family Courts have to deal with. There would be no need for Family Law (or lawyers).
There are some drawbacks however. Couples, if they want, cannot go out and start a family together. Fathers cannot stay in the same household, even if they want to. There is a strict sense of separation and attachment by blood.
The Moso’s way of life has both good and bad ramifications for families and love. In my opinion however, they have solved the domestic relations issues that we have been plagued with in our country and culture.
