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A Not So Intimate Angle
Over the course of the twenty-first century, the world has been growing exponentially into an individualistic state. Our rapid movement into the post-modern era is driving people to listen to iPods alone instead of radios together, a tendency that demos our abilities to nurse our individual needs on our own. Yet even while we may be idealistically moving forward into a future of personal independence, our growth is still suspended by our incessant need to find a suitable partner to share our lives with. Regardless of it's friction against natural instincts, the bias and stereotypes it creates, or the toll it takes on mental and physical levels, society still irrationally seeks this companionship as if compelled by some invisible (and fabricated) “love” force. This is why I feel that in order for the populace to truly tend to the needs and wants of individuals in our modern society, it must be recognized that today's marriage and intimate relationships are errors resultant from our past cultures and history.
Marriage began as a simple and effective form of economic exchange in primitive cultures. Fathers used their daughters as items to trade for livestock, food, and land, and it was expected that their daughters marry customers. This process was erroneous at its conception: the father's surrender of the daughter left him with more goods, but one less set of hands that was instead obligated to support her husband. The opportunity cost of this transaction is extremely high compared to what the father received because the long term benefits of having a daughter and her labor are no longer part of the father's assets. Economically speaking, this reduction in labor for the family indirectly results in a decrease in inventories.
Next we must analyze the similarities between chimpanzees and humans to further explain the flaws in intimate relationships. In 2002, the Genomic Sciences Center in Japan
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tasked itself with mapping the similarities between us and our primate cousins. After acquiring roughly 77,000 chimpanzee DNA fragments, the scientists used nitrogenous bases as references to line each fragment up with a respective human genome sequence. This molecular technique helped determine that chimpanzees differ by less than 2 percent to human beings. With a 98.77% comparability to chimpanzees, it is not rash to suggest that our natural instincts towards intimacy are that much similar. Chimpanzees form social groups called unit groups that are structured mostly by a linear male hierarchy with one male as the alpha male. It is the nature of all of the males in the unit groups to procreate with any of the females which results in a much less structured female hierarchy and extremely diverse offspring (J. Conciatore).
Based on this evidence, human males are much the same way. Despite the suppression of these instincts based on the aberrant norms of society, it is not natural for men to be restricted to one female. This is why men often find themselves thinking about attractive women in sexual ways that are labeled by society as shallow or improper. Men instinctively fantasize about attractive women because they are the most suitable mates for reproduction. Large breasts or curvaceous hips are visual clues to males that females are fit for reproduction, which reaffirms the tendency for men to eye particular attributes of women they encounter. Simultaneously, it is a woman's instinct to echo male instincts and embellish themselves or “dress to impress.” Today, women dress in unfastened or form fitted clothes that accentuate breasts and body figures in order to draw attention to themselves and alert males that they are desirable mates. Even more remarkable is the large percentage of women who habitually dress in this way during the “periods” of time when they are most fertile (Sullivan). Unfortunately, because of the conception of marriage and emphasis on intimate relationships, all of these indicators and instincts are eventually suppressed. Married men who stare at breasts and bodies of other women are labeled as unfaithful; women who dress in a
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revealing or sexy way are labeled as promiscuous, and humans are left internally battling themselves. But even the evolution of our complex culture cannot and should not prevent humans from carrying out what is biologically natural. There is no reason for any person to desire the long term relationships that society condones because we are impulsively driven against them.
Having ignored our own instincts, our natural evolution has invented new ways of penalizing us within the tenure of intimacy. Even something as simple as an argument between partners actually causes women to physically suffer. Research conducted by the Society for Neuroscience has determined that the mind-body link is so strong that the the degrees with which we feel specific emotions or stress can adversely affect the performance of the immune system. When arguments between partners occur, both parties may suffer, but it is the women that are undoubtedly harmed. It is important to recognize that when arguments occur, a woman's emotions may not always match her physiological response. While a man's physiological response is directly related to presence or absence of emotion, a woman will biologically respond even if she does not appear to be emotional. When men are arguing, they are aware of their physiological responses because they are directly proportionate to their emotions, so they withdraw from the situation to prevent a negative physical response. Women are statistically better at expressing and interpreting emotions verbally, so when men remove themselves, women are unable to address their partner's frustration and/or they cannot vent their own. In both of these instances, a woman's physiologically response from the consequent stress endures the duration of the argument and continues to affect her (Smith). As a result of the increased stress levels, the female brain responds by releasing molecules called cytokines that are responsible for immune responses. Normally these simple proteins are the body's defense against sickness, creating bodily responses that serve more as symptoms for diagnosis than for their original
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purpose for fighting infection. But whether women are sick or simply arguing, cytokines enter the circulatory system and activate nerves that induce responses like fever and sluggishness, or even immune suppression. The combined havoc that cytokines wreak on the immune system leaves the female body easily susceptible to viruses and bacteria that it would otherwise be resistant to. This evidence shows that women will become ill if they decide to become intimate with another (Neuroscience).
Throughout history, the inequalities in the social status of men and women women continually labels women as a minority group. As a minority, women are underrepresented in establishments ranging from government to corporate and business leadership and even at home in many cases. Until recently, history has not been kind to movements promoting the suffrage of women who stand to improve their rights and standard of living, and society still prevents the complete acceptance of femininity and the opportunities for women to be leaders and/or independent. The issue in this case still remains to be the existence of intimate relationships because they come with expectations and stereotypes that traditionally place men at the “head of households.” Women are expected to give up their ambitions in order to care for children, prepare food, tend to the shelter, and wear the clothes that are based on the income that men provide. Whether or not a woman is employed, she will lose either way. If she is not employed, she is in danger of being unable to fend for herself and/or her children if the relationship is lost. If she does have a job she is charged with being negligent to her partner and her children. These situations are comparatively detrimental to women, ergo the predicament women often find themselves in when they are attacked by stereotypes and the consequences of choosing intimacy.
In many cases, the majority of people in society believe that intimate relationships are natural, beneficial and perhaps even crucial to a good standard of living and happiness. Most of
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those who refute this argument have strong facts at their disposal that provide a strong basis for reevaluation. Unfortunately the persons in charge of calculating divorce rates are neither persuasive nor intelligent enough to document which couples are divorcing during what years, so it is easy for people to argue that the people divorcing in a given year are not the same as the ones who are marrying. With that statistic rendered useless, the next step for a critic would be to establish the claim that intimacy is actually beneficial to individuals and empowers them to work harder, become more successful, become better parents, and lead a happier life. They would say that the small difference between us and chimpanzees is our ability to empathize with other people and perhaps even love someone, and that the reason we strive for something so irrational is because it gives our lives a purpose. But even if the hyper critic were to counter the health ailments of arguments with "love hormones" like dopamine for its blissful effects or oxytocin for its ability to emotionally bond partners during and after sex, their contention still does not solve the impossible needs of modern society. If it did work then there would certainly be no reason to question intimacy. Perhaps then the best solution to satisfy the opposition would be the movement from the increased emphasis on sex to increased emphasis on intimacy. In reality, the mere existence of teenagers and the media's focus on them shows that raging hormones have no intentions of reversing history and changing the outlook on marriage, women who dress in sexy clothes, and men who have no intention of averting their surely well-meant stares.
