Even in such societies as feudal China/Japan, one wife/husband was preferred. If the partner was found out to commit adultery, the punishment could be severe depending a little on which social status he/she belonged to. If it was a lord or somesuch, he/she had the will to remarry, but if you had a low social status, you could be completely disbanded or even be forced to commit seppuku, particularly if you belonged to one of the samurai families.

It is also true that women in reality have control, but a control they seldom if never use. Coming back to the gypsies again, if a female would put the closest skirt to her body onto a male's head, he has to leave her immediately and wash himself, because he now has become unclean and tainted. Ultimately, the most striking question is, why do women consider themselves satisfied with their role of being inferior, when they obviously have means to change this actively? As a matter of fact, it is the WOMEN who uphold this power structure among themselves, not the men. This is very true for female circumcision as well, where the elderly women in the village (or society) will perform it on the girls, and same in societies where girls get married away where the MOTHER or any other close relative arranges the marriage, NOT the father or the man in the household. The man merely manages the economical part, but it is ultimately the mother who picks out the to-be-husband.

There have been an argument for that women (and men accordingly) are considered more attractive by having a clear seperation between genders and gender roles. However, this in turn, merely stems from a sort of romanticism of the opposite sex, and question in reality whether this still would lead to say, better relationships.

You're completely right about female sexuality. I honestly can't think of any logical reason why anyone would demonize it. Maybe because they were afraid of the persuasive powers of free female sexuality. Usually women have an edge over men when it comes to persuading men into doing things against their will. Even Muslims use it (albeit indirectly) in their Jihad to persuade men into killing themselves.

Basically, christianity is based on a patriarchal system of keeping the tabs on who gets to fertilze the women. If you don't force women into male ownership/marriage, how are you going to guarantee that the kids you are feeding are your own?

Hm, what sort of practices are you thinking of exactly? Certain sexual activities or? Delaney herself doesn't answer why women's sexuality is so demonized throughout reilgion though, but I guess it is a feasible theory that yes, some practices were copied and then got stuck.

It is very evident in less secular religions that women are considered tainted as I described about gypsies and Muslims. Actually, the very reason a womans' veil should be black is to show she is tainted, since white is the color of purity and thus, the color of god. They should also wear red belts when they are considered sexually active (read married).

And couldn't it be that several "unfriendly" practices were logical once, to prevent disease for instance, but were just passed down through religion and conservative cultures into becoming what they are now; a bunch of silly unnecessary rituals?