Note to reader – Please read this thought experiment with an
open mind.I am not suggesting we try to follow this alternate world and have
sex with multiple partners; I am just trying to decode the impact of default
physiological process of sex towards our society, economy, politics and psychology. So take some time and think before calling me a sexual pervert or interpreting on my personal sex life :)
Why sex is so complex in our society? Society is always
trying to stop sexuality – we have problems when boys and girls meet. Parents
try to have direct/indirect influence on choosing your partner-there is so many
fights around marriage (divorce etc.) etc. We have a skewed sex ratio, huge
sexual perversion problem (rape, sexual abuse etc.), huge industries catering
to alternate sex options (prostitution, pornography etc.) and of course a huge
medical industry catering to procreation avoidance (condom, contraceptives,
abortion etc.).
Why do you think sex is so special in human interaction? Why
we don’t bother if I (as a male) smile or talk to multiple girls (some society
has problems with that as well) but society does not accept me having sex with
multiple girls? It is special because by default sex can give birth to a
newborn baby and it costs (and takes huge amount of time & responsibility)
to raise a child. In a society where everyone is having sex with everyone we
will have too many newborn babies and very few will take ownership of these
newborns. To avoid that problem society created the concept of marriage and
single partner and hence extramarital affairs are seen as crimes. But I think
it is an artificial solution – as human beings we generally love variety (would
you prefer to have same food every day for rest of your life?)but are asked to
have sex with only one partner for rest of our life. This sometimes turns into prostitution,
rape, cheating etc. Most women will criticize this conclusion stating these are
men power-plays/dominations and you are a pervert preferring blind dates (no
emotion). But I would request them to think if they will also prefer to have
romantic & sexual relationship with multiple partners if that was not a
taboo.
Consider a society where the default was different. By
default you won’t conceive and you can have any number of sexual encounters
with any number of partners without any fear of being pregnant. If you really
want to conceive with your chosen partner (who has wilfully agreed to take
responsibility to raise the child) you take some medicine for some time and now
your lovemaking will make you pregnant.
If you are thinking it is a perfect recipe for AIDS epidemic
think again. Nobody is stopping you using your condom but the main problem of
not having multiple sex partners is the fear of procreation and associated
social cost.
Unfortunately our defaults were different and I am not sure
with evolution if our defaults will change one day. There may be a grand plan
behind this which I am missing out completely – happy to hear your views...
