(no subject)

[arethinn]

LOL... Draft Registration

Seriously though, with talk of the draft murmuring around, I'm even gladder I'm planning on skipping town. I sometimes wonder why people make so much of the idea that *gasp* women would be included in such a draft. I mean, yes, it's terrible - but so is drafting men. Equally terrible. Just as it should be equally fine for women to join voluntarily, and not thought of as kind of weird. I think thoughts and values regarding armed forces are stuck rather further back in time than on many other topics.

Comments

[twopiearr.livejournal.com]

from a purely darwinian species survival standpoint, it doesn't make sense. it takes a lot less males than it does females to repopulate, if it comes down to that.

(okay, yes, theoretically you want as many of each as possible to prevent genetic sequences from getting to close to one another and rendering the entire population vulnerable to Bad Ass Microbe #aleph-1. but still.)

[arethinn]

Okay, but in a cultural sense...?

Or is war, at least as we know it, just too far down the hierarchy of evolution (eros and thanatos, here) to be able to be held to a "cultural" standard?

[shalora.livejournal.com]

Actually, war is very cultural. I'm in an intro to social and cultural anthropology class, and we've just been discussing this. Apparently, war is almost unheard of, let alone pervasive like ours, in matrilineal societies. That's where, once people are married, the groom relocates to live with the bride's family. This is even more true if the society is both matrilineal and matrifocal. That's where women have great social power and prestige. (since there are no true matriarchal societies) Actually, that also intrigues me; when women are in charge, the society tends to be egalitarian. When men are in charge, the society tends to be patriarchal. Not male-bashing, just intrigued by some apparently gender-linked behavior! Anyway, having the men spread out among many different villages seems to reduce the instinct of "this is *my* land, these women are *my* women, and you're gonna have to fight me for them!" Also, they have brothers and fathers and friends in the other communities, and they live (at first, anyway) with a bunch of strangers. So, they are much less eager to band up with the local guys and go on a killing spree.
Aren't people interesting? I love this class.