The beehive analogy naturalized a hierarchy of dutiful workers under a ruler

Evidence

The organic society was to be modeled on nature’s prime examples of communal colonies—bees and ants. Civil life should imitate nature, as exemplified by the political constitution of the bee. All workers must join together in common to produce welfare for the whole and sweetness in the honey while the queen superintends. Care must be taken that the workers continue to produce diligently and do not indulge in luxury lest the citizens become “effeminate and bow their necks to manly valor.” — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 342

Categorization

• XREF: Beehive-as-monarchy parallels the tamarisk/living-root-bridge infrastructure thread from the Grafting essay — nature invoked to ratify a specific social order. — connects to: The body-as-metaphor legitimated social hierarchy as naturally given

Broader Connections

• The body-as-metaphor legitimated social hierarchy as naturally given #exemplifies (0.85)