Why evolutionary psychology is teh suxx0rs
Mar. 7th, 2007 12:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sabotabbyDoes evolutionary psychology even exist as a discipline outside of the interblahgs? I don't think it does. ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
realcdaae did a good post awhile back where she referred to it as Social Darwinism for the 21st century—pseudo-science used to justify essentialist gender roles distilled from an idealized version of 1950s America. Which it is, of course, but my explanation was less charitable: It's a pseudo-science invented by dorky first-year college students to explain why they can't get dates.
As far as I can tell from reading posts by evo-trolls on feminist blogs, the logic goes something like this: Men and women are locked into gender roles established back when we lived in caves and men hunted and women gathered. Those who get their anthropological knowledge from somewhere other than the Flintstones will immediately see the problem with this basic assumption.
Earliest evidence of useless lug managing to get with a hot chick.
But let's assume they're right for a moment, and every modern discrepancy between men and women (there are only two genders in evolutionary psychology) can be traced back to something perfectly logical in human evolution. My personal favourite is the argument that men don't clean as often because they evolved with less of an ability to see dirt. This makes sense, because sharper vision is necessary for raising babies but not for hunting.
It seems, though, that belief in evo-psych is directly proportionate to one's inability to attract an appropriate "female mate" (evo-psych proponents never fail to describe women as such). It's a problem closely related to Nice GuyismTM; this belief system maintains that men are naturally attracted to conventionally attractive women (with symmetrical features! that indicate health for making babies!) and women look for qualities such as stability and financial security (geeky but nice! to support the babies!). This has everything to do with science, and nothing to do with popular culture memes that insist that the dirty, uncouth, beer-swilling schtub is always entitled to a hot chick. (It's been like this throughout human history. See illustration of cave-people, above.)
Evo-psych, despite pseudo-scientific pretensions, is closely linked to the fundangelical religious notion of man-as-beast, requiring the civilizing influence of a woman to be complete (but, of course, men instinctively need to spread their seed as far as possible, so they can't help cheating. Once they manage to get dates, that is.).
Finally, it's related to libertarianism (as is Social Darwinism), which is, interestingly enough, also related to an inability to get dates. Possibly because no one wants to date a guy who will kill and eat you if his trust fund runs out.
Feel free to spout off with your favourite evo-psych links and theories in the comments.
realcdaae did a good post awhile back where she referred to it as Social Darwinism for the 21st century—pseudo-science used to justify essentialist gender roles distilled from an idealized version of 1950s America. Which it is, of course, but my explanation was less charitable: It's a pseudo-science invented by dorky first-year college students to explain why they can't get dates.As far as I can tell from reading posts by evo-trolls on feminist blogs, the logic goes something like this: Men and women are locked into gender roles established back when we lived in caves and men hunted and women gathered. Those who get their anthropological knowledge from somewhere other than the Flintstones will immediately see the problem with this basic assumption.
Earliest evidence of useless lug managing to get with a hot chick.
But let's assume they're right for a moment, and every modern discrepancy between men and women (there are only two genders in evolutionary psychology) can be traced back to something perfectly logical in human evolution. My personal favourite is the argument that men don't clean as often because they evolved with less of an ability to see dirt. This makes sense, because sharper vision is necessary for raising babies but not for hunting.
It seems, though, that belief in evo-psych is directly proportionate to one's inability to attract an appropriate "female mate" (evo-psych proponents never fail to describe women as such). It's a problem closely related to Nice GuyismTM; this belief system maintains that men are naturally attracted to conventionally attractive women (with symmetrical features! that indicate health for making babies!) and women look for qualities such as stability and financial security (geeky but nice! to support the babies!). This has everything to do with science, and nothing to do with popular culture memes that insist that the dirty, uncouth, beer-swilling schtub is always entitled to a hot chick. (It's been like this throughout human history. See illustration of cave-people, above.)
Evo-psych, despite pseudo-scientific pretensions, is closely linked to the fundangelical religious notion of man-as-beast, requiring the civilizing influence of a woman to be complete (but, of course, men instinctively need to spread their seed as far as possible, so they can't help cheating. Once they manage to get dates, that is.).
Finally, it's related to libertarianism (as is Social Darwinism), which is, interestingly enough, also related to an inability to get dates. Possibly because no one wants to date a guy who will kill and eat you if his trust fund runs out.
Feel free to spout off with your favourite evo-psych links and theories in the comments.
