Under the Green Moon: Sex, Reproduction and Family, Part 1

[roseembolism]

I've been having a bit of trouble locking down this complicated and contentious issue, especially because reproduction is linked to the status of women. So if these thoughts seem random, it's because well, they still are, and I can use input, bearing in mind this is a "Hard Fantasy" setting.

Comments

[heron61]

I like it. I can also see some effectively universal (largely because they are seriously ancient) genetic tweaks for everything from voluntary ovulation (& and possibly sperm production), some increased resistance to infections, and some other tweaks to make childbrith easier and safer.

As for cultural effects, in some ways its difficult to tell, since we are less than 50 years into a world which has begun rapidly heading towards actual gender equality. If you assume that the most recent fallen world-civilization had such equality, then I'd imagine that many of the baseline assumptions of about gender inequality that Eurasian human civilization has dealt with for the last 4,000+ years would simply not exist.

As a short form: No one in cities would be remotely surprised to see women in positions of authority, including commanding men, to the extent that jokes, discomfort, and hostility towards women in power or men who have female superiors would not merely not exist, it would make no more sense than someone in our culture believing that people with green eyes would inherently superior to people with blue eyes and that a green eyed person was inherently shamed by being in a subordinate position to a blue eyed person.

Beyond that, borrow liberally from Vonda McIntyre's Dreamsnake

Also, sexual harassment would definitely still exist, but would almost certainly be in specific situations where people in positions of power harass their subordinates, regardless of who is male or female.

My partner teaotter got her undergrad degree in Communications and one fact she encountered was the fact that stereotypically "feminine" behavior patterns are in all cases subordinate behavior patterns (which is borne out by my own studies of cultural anthro).

Also, assume sexual preference at whatever ratio you like - almost certainly the rate of homosexuality significantly higher than our own 10%, but also almost certainly lower than 100% - unless you want this to be a bisexuality is the default sort of setting (which is perfectly reasonable).

[mindstalk]

"almost certainly the rate of homosexuality significantly higher than our own 10%"

Why?
(And the 10% seems dubious too.)

[heron61]

Even in openly homophobic cultures, the rate of situational homosexuality among men and (although this has been less studied) among women is well higher than 10%. Then, add in the fact of various cultures were homosexual/bisexual behavior was the norm, at least in some situations (ranging from ritual homosexuality in upland New Guinea, to homosexual behavior in the Classical world), and it definitely looks to me like the Western World's rate of homosexuality and bisexuality has artificially low (almost certainly due to the still high, but also gradually declining rate of homophobia, and the more pervasive fact that homosexuality is outside the range of cultural norms - although all of this is changing rather rapidly).

Genetics may play a part in sexual preference, but all the data I've seen makes it look like genetics at most plays the same role it does with intelligence ( ie well less than most people think), here's my own analogy-based take on the origins of sexual preference.

[roseembolism]

I like the way you're thinking. I see based on thousands of years of available contraceptives, and the remaining memories of past civilizations, egalitarianism would be common- especially in the civilizations directly descended from the last Great Civilization.

I can see a lot of minor tweeks, from natural contraception, to tooth decay resistance, even among the Old Race humans, who are descended from the high-tech equivalent of Amish survivalists.

As for authority, the only difference would come into areas where pure physical power is needed- and the differences in breeds would be far greater than that of men and women. So in the empires, shock troopers in the armies who are selected for physical strength would be from appropriate breeds...and led by men or women with the appropriate magical talents and tactical ability.

As for sex ratio, I'm thinking a high rate of bisexuality- 50% or more. This is complicated by an attitude of "You have to have children to work on the farm/care for the parents in old age/run the family business/be an heir to the nobility. Beyond that, who cares who you have sex with".