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The male sex drive is to blame for most of the world's conflicts from football hooliganism to religious disputes and even world wars, according to scientists.
The "male warrior" instinct means that men are programmed to be aggressive towards anyone they view as an outsider, a study claims.
In evolutionary terms an instinct for violence against others helped early men improve their status and gain more access to mates, but in modern terms this can translate into large-scale wars.
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Originally Posted by John1960
The male sex drive is to blame for most of the world's conflicts from football hooliganism to religious disputes and even world wars, according to scientists.
The "male warrior" instinct means that men are programmed to be aggressive towards anyone they view as an outsider, a study claims.
In evolutionary terms an instinct for violence against others helped early men improve their status and gain more access to mates, but in modern terms this can translate into large-scale wars.
Male aggression in general is overplayed. I think the article is true in some sense that males tend to be more territorial, but humans and chimps are different species, so they should stop comparing the two as if they are the same. Bonobos, or pygmy chimpanzees, have a matriachal society and are much less violent than chimpanzees.
Yes, it is true that it is mostly men who fight and kill, but that's largely the role they've taken because the women are busy raising the children. I don't think women are any more friendly to strangers - not by a long shot. It's just if a woman wants a stranger gone she might get her male to scare him off. The fact women are just as suspicious of illegal immigrants supports this.
I think we all accept that males are more innately aggressive because of testosterone but is that really true? Male bears are never as aggressive as a female is when she's protecting her cubs. Females in many species have been shown to be very territorial and competitive too, fighting with males and other females.
Widespread wars are totally different to tribal skirmishes. They have more to do with politics and resources than the 'male sex drive.'
I didn't read the article, but I have heard warnings that the highly unbalanced sex ratio in CHINA (a great shortage of eligible young women there, due to the nation's one-child policy and selective abortions) will lead to great frustration among millions of young Chinese men who will be unable to find marriage/sex partners, who as a result may vent their hostility in the form of future military aggression (either that, or those men will have to import brides from neighboring countries who may be enticed by China's higher standard of living).
Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
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Originally Posted by slowlane3
I didn't read the article, but I have heard warnings that the highly unbalanced sex ratio in CHINA (a great shortage of eligible young women there, due to the nation's one-child policy and selective abortions) will lead to great frustration among millions of young Chinese men who will be unable to find marriage/sex partners, who as a result may vent their hostility in the form of future military aggression (either that, or those men will have to import brides from neighboring countries who may be enticed by China's higher standard of living).
I hear some Chinese men are going to other countries, where there are more women than men, to find brides, but there are still so many of them.
The whole idea of preferring a boy just proves to me that human beings only care about their family, they haven't yet evolved to feel a sense of 'national identity.'
Perhaps next on the agenda is legalizing bigamy, so that these men do not miss out. I also won't be surprised to see a greater proliferation of prostitution in China, already happening now.
I think there is a point here. A great part of the world's conflict is religious based and much of that is precipitated by men. I guess a case could be made that religions repress sexuality or make these men feel guilty and powerless against their own feelings. They suppress their feelings which eventually express themselves as hostility, often against women - or women are often blamed for men feeling the way they do.
From my experiences men do react more violently to "the other", but I'd agree this doesn't mean women are all flowers and sunshine to "different/outsiders." They're just more "non-violent aggression." Insults, ostracism, psychological warfare, etc rather than outright violence. Possibly an all female world would be more "Trail of Tears" situations of the "We don't want to kill or beat you, but we'd like you to go over there and not talk to us anymore okay." Granted that's being stereotypical, but so is their study.
Although I admit what I'd heard in the past is that men's greater violence is do toward our tendency to hierarchies and group-loyalty. That we don't do violence so much because we're so aggressive, but because we want approval from our comrades and I suppose father-figures. Fascism being the most extreme example of that. (Yes there were female Fascists, but they were fairly outnumbered and Fascism was almost cartoonishly hyper-masculine. To the point some, even in the 1930s, saw it as vaguely homoerotic. On the flip the thing I saw that said this didn't say loyalty and hierarchies were automatically wrong or bad. They allowed big organized violence, but you could also see it inspiring good things too.)
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