The Plague of Male Dominance

In this book the author offers explanations of why male dominance and religious dogma have prevented human beings from achieving the peace, security and prosperity that most people desire. Known for his business and cultural-insight books on China, Japan, Korea and Mexico, De Mente attributes the weaknesses and/or failings of all of the fundamental elements of human cultures on the dominance factor in the genetic programming of human males. "Males are designed to dominate in all of their relationships, particularly with females, and this is at the core of most of the problems that have afflicted mankind since the origin of the species," De Mente says. "This dominate trait in the make-up of males was responsible for the creation not only of the world's cultures but also the creation of gods to explain the phenomena of life, nature and the cosmos in general," he adds. De Mente says that when males in the human species became self-aware they developed a compelling urge for an explanation of life and the material world around them, and began creating gods to explain how it all came about. "Virtually all if not all ancient people created a multitude of gods to explain their existence and the existence of animals, the seas, the mountains, the weather and other elements of nature-resulting in an array of gods that in some cultures continue to be worshipped today." he adds. "Then between four and five thousand years ago the religious leaders of a group of Hebrew tribes who lived what is now Israel gradually came to the conclusion that there should be just one god so they created a single god and began to preach that he was the only God." [Members of these tribes later became known as Jews, from the name of one of the tribes.] "However, this one-god theology was not effective in changing the inherent nature of men, so some two thousand years ago Jewish prophets decided to add an additional element by introducing an earthly representative of God who decades after his birth became known as Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who could act directly with his followers and presumably be more effective. "This too failed to curb the ignorance, willful stupidity and violent nature of males, so still today all of the different versions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam-along with other religious cults-are rent with varying degrees of discrimination, greed, intolerance and violence." The book explains why males regard themselves as superior to females; why females are in fact superior to males; why both male and female sexuality has been misunderstood and misused; the damage done to females by religions, and the transition from a religious-based morality to a money-and-profit-based morality that has spread around the world. De Mente outlines fundamental changes that he says are essential before human beings can rise up out of the muck and mire of all of the male-created and male-dominated cultural institutions-religious, economic, educational, political and social-and achieve their full potential.