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[Marxism] Clitoris, orgasm and Darwinism
I have been away and must apologize for taking so long to reply.
At 04:45 AM 21/01/2005, Rohan Gaiswinkler wrote:
Ken Ranney wrote:
>But I would thing that evolution 'clever' enough to create the
>eye and the associated parts of the brain necessary to convey the signals
>to the cerebral cortex and there to interpret them ought to be able to
>eliminate, or at least equalize for all humans, painful labour.
I think you are assuming that there HAVN'T been evolutionary changes with
humans to reduce child birth pain. Well what about the fact that in with
humans, the 'sex pleasure centre' for females (ie the cliterous) is on the
outside, UNLIKE ANY OTHER ANIMAL.
You have brought up an interesting facet. Sexual intercourse, for Darwin,
serves the purpose only of producing offspring, not the ecstasy we
associate with it. A woman in a British TV comedy puts the female aspect,
though from the ?God? side rather than the Darwinian, quite succinctly:
?If sex was purely for procreation, God wouldn't have created a
clitoris.? (The God sex guide, GUARDIAN WEEKLY, August 2 1998.)
In Darwin?s scheme, sex is indeed ?purely for procreation?. Hence there
might be no clitoris, though this is debatable. That absence of the
clitoris does not impede reproduction is demonstrated in certain backward
areas of the world, where so-called ?female circumcision? intentionally
removes the clitoris of young girls. Despite this ghastly procedure,
clitorectomized women are in such demand by the local men that women who
have not been victims of this genital mutilation are shunned for marriage,
and population growth, a keystone of Darwinism, continues unabated.
Orgasm is not required for procreation; hence it could not have come from
Darwinian selection, which produces only the bare (pun not intended)
essentials. Sexual intercourse is sufficiently rewarding that we would all
be here, even without orgasm of either males or females. According to
Gleitman,
..sexual stimulation is rewarding in its own right..... so many humans
engage in sexual foreplay and try to lengthen the time before orgasm. 1
Orgasm results from sexual activity; it is not the initiator; it comes at
the end, not the beginning. It arises, not directly from the pleasurable
sensations of sexual intercourse, but from within the person enjoying it,
seemingly from nowhere - it is a gift, not an earned feature. It is safe
to say that, for men, vaginal intercourse feels so good in (pun not
intended) and of itself that it does not require orgasm to make it a
phenomenon of overwhelming desire. It is supremely compelling even before
it is entered into for the first time, or it would not be performed, given
all the obstacles to it. When a man plunges into a woman, he does so, not
with the hope of a future reward, but with the immediate enjoyment of every
motion.
We may think of intercourse as requiring orgasm for completion, so that
frustration will not follow, but in fact it is ejaculation which is
required for the male to be fulfilled, and of course for pregnancy to
occur. Ejaculation and delivery of spermatozoa to the appropriate site
could take place with little awareness by the male, who would still feel
satisfied. It is hard to believe that any man approaches any woman with
the thought simply of achieving orgasm--?the sexual desire is the
compelling force.
Birds, dogs and other mammals do it quickly, why should we not? I seem to
recall that Darwin said that natural selection wastes nothing, and orgasm
is clearly a waste.
To summarize, both clitoris and orgasm are unnecessary for
reproduction. They cannot be explained by evolution as a result of chance
variations.
Have at me, if you will. If you do not, I will be even more convinced than
I am that this is a chink in the armour of Darwinism.
Ken Ranney
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- [Marxism] Clitoris, orgasm and Darwinism,
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