anthropology
Okay. I'm only going to get into this briefly because it's a shitstorm waiting to happen and I don't feel like wearing out my delete key when the email starts flooding in, but here goes.For those of you who have previously insisted that life is somehow more "interesting" without gender roles, and that to ignore them is a sign of maturity or enlightenment, I'd just like to say: Give it hell! Whatever you feel like you want to do to be happy, I am 100% in support of, as long as it doesn't damage or retard my persuit of a freshly toasted bagel or a cup of coffee.
However, to say that gender roles such as they are are purely based on societal pressures and not on any biological wiring is pure hogwash.
Follow me along one example, just for giggles:
I think we can all accept as fact that the primary goal of any species is to replicate itself, to continue its "way of life". In the case of humans, that means eating bagels and wearing watches. In the case of giraffes, that means walking around and eating leaves. There are many viable means of replication of a species which mother nature has invented, but one of the most successful involves the notion of gender.
Now, in the case of mammals, this replication procedure is carried out by two different genders, which we will call male and female for the purposes of discussion. The male mammal injects a fertilizing agent into the female, and her innards use that agent to turn the eggs they have lying about into the beginnings of a child mammal. This process of making a child takes time, however, and means that the mother of the future mammal has to endure what is known as a "gestation period". During this period, the "mother" (or female) has to carry inside her body the gestating child.
From the standpoint of replication and propagation of the species, this is wasted time. The mother can not be impregnated again until after she has had the child she is currently carrying. This presents a problem, but thankfully mother nature has had the benefit of millions of years to roll the dice on coming up with a solution, and one has been found!
The male of the species is able to impregnate as many women as he can get his hands and/or genitals on! Thusly, it is possible for every potential mother to be impregnated at any given time with only one fertile male on hand (within reason, of course. There's only so much time in a day, ladies.)
So, here we have the beginnings of the acceptibility for promiscuousness on the part of a male. I think you guys can interpolate from here, but I would like to point out that I think pretty much all of our social picadillos have a biological root. Feel free to cite anthropological studies to the contrary, though!
Am I making sense here, girls?
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