Evolutionary Mindset Demonstrated
I was scanning the blogosphere this morning and found this gem from The Atheocracy:
Why would sexuality seemingly be the one preference in human existence where there’s just one right choice, and it’s black or white? Humans are complex creatures. Our preferences for foods, drinks, friends, TV shows, movies and even, yes, blogs are pretty fluid. They change over time; they aren’t usually extreme (”That new Ben Affleck movie sucked, but it didn’t suck quite as much as his previous movie”). Our minds don’t tend to think of preferences in black/white terms. It’s all shades of constant grays.
So why would we think sexuality is different? It’s one of a very few acts that connects us with our most distant ancestors. Every human who has ever lived past the age of about 8 has experienced some sort of sexual desire (And some earlier than that … shout out to my Kindergarten girlfriend, Melissa. Rawr!). I believe these desires are just as fluid and gray as any others. The ideas of heterosexuality and homosexuality are created by humans in a society that would prefer to label people in this manner. In the human mind, those labels don’t exist. It’s all situational. It’s all genetics. Even Christians can’t seriously claim humans should have sex only for procreation. (source)
I actually agree with Jeff right up to this point. However, he concludes that “. . . if there are other reasons for sex, there is no reason to restrict which consenting adults can have sex with each other.” Huh? Now that sounds like Jeff has just concluded what a person with an evolutionary mindset would conclude.
Let me explain. Starting from the premise that we are nothing more than animals–highly evolved ones, but animals nonetheless–we look at how the other animals handle sex and monogamy. Well, except for certain birds, monogamy is all but unheard of. Sex is had wherever, whenever, and with whomever it is desired. Now, since we evolved from animals and are really animals ourselves, then there is no reason to obey any sort of etiquette about sex–especially when it’s derived from a 4000 year old book. We’re so much smarter now.
So much smarter, in fact, that we are removing restrictions placed on which consenting adults can have sex, and thus stepping backwards to behavior found in lower forms of life?
Interesting.
Thanks again for the pingback, Cory. As always, I enjoy the debate.
The thing is, I don’t think we’re “removing restrictions.” I’m saying the restrictions have always been artificial and meaningless. Why, exactly, should there be restrictions on sex between any consenting adults? You’re partly right that it’s about us being just like other animals, but only in that we have the same sexual desires that they do. I think there could potentially be restrictions or etiquettes on which consenting adults have sex with each other, but I fail to see any logical reason why one of those restrictions should be sex between same-sex partners.
The Bible says a lot of things, depending upon who is interpreting it. Christians everywhere already ignore certain parts as being “archaic” or “metaphorical” or whatever. The flap against homosexual sex reeks of a group of people trying to restrict something they’re personally uncomfortable with, and making themselves feel like the righteous ones at the same time. If they have to make a large group of their brothers and sisters feel like second-class citizens in the process, so be it.
There’s nothing in evolution that says retaining an unneeded trait is a good thing. Eyes for cave-dwellers, hair and legs for the permanently aquatic, wings for penguins, tails in apes, etc: all pared away by the knife of time.
But to me, it’s hardly an evolutionary idea. Social rules (”memes”
generally work a lot faster than physical evolution, though similar rules apply: if a meme prevents itself from spreading, or is prevented from spreading by a more infectious meme, then the meme will die out. Religion and sexuality feature strongly in the study of memetics.