Social Utopia: How an Unbiased, Ideology-Free Society Should Treat the Diversity of Human Sexuality. Column for Computerra #109

← Dmitry Shabanov → On the humanities and natural-science approach to an explosive topic: a discussion of the causes of homosexual behaviour Social Utopia: how an unbiased, ideology-free society should treat the diversity of manifestations of human sexuality A specific regulatory mechanism or selection? Discussion of one hypothesis on the reproductive mechanisms of interspecific hybrids of green frogs Column for Computerra #108 Column for Computerra #109 Column for Computerra #110 Concluding my previous column, I declared that the natural-science approach allows one to find simple solutions to complex social problems. I was immediately challenged to prove it. Very well — let me attempt to demonstrate the mode of reasoning I consider correct. Do I believe that society will heed such arguments and begin making decisions on the basis of evidence rather than dogma? There is no hope for the near future, so you may regard my reasoning as utopian. On the other hand, constant dripping wears away a stone. I know in advance that some of my critics will claim my arguments are untenable because I failed to mention such-and-such, made unsupported assertions about this or that, failed to justify some particular point, and ignored certain circumstances. Alas, I cannot compress the incompressible into this column; a thorough substantiation of everything that deserves consideration would require at the very least a substantial book. I often feel I could write it. I would sit down to write it without delay were I confident that it would persuade a higher proportion of its readers than this column does. Alas, I have no such confidence. In all likelihood, the majority of my readers will fall into one of two categories. The first will be capable of accepting the view of reality I am proposing (or will already have accepted it). The details of my argumentation — whether it is good or poor — can only be discussed with them. The second will reject my reasoning regardless of how detailed it is, accusing me either of propagandising immorality or of homophobia. They are convinced they already possess the final truth, and I, as will become evident, am not prepared to accept it uncritically. Above all, one ought to address a third category of readers — those who can be persuaded. I fear that this category is fictitious… So, the substantiation of my theses will not fit into the column. Some of them I have discussed in previous columns; others remain to be addressed. Let us proceed: — the human being is a biosocial creature possessing two natures: a biological one (grounded primarily in genetic inheritance) and a social one (existing by virtue of cultural inheritance); — the human being is a product of evolution; the causes of our biological nature are explained by a process that continued for nearly four billion years and gave rise both to our species and to millions of species of our relatives; — the distinctive feature of the most recent stages of our biological evolution is the perfection of the capacity to form a complex social nature; — the prerequisites of our social properties — including our multi-level needs, our readiness to acquire language and logical reasoning, our motivational control system, and much else — are rooted in our biological nature; — our biological nature is anachronistic (adapted to a different epoch), since it was shaped not by present-day selection but by the selection that operated throughout our evolutionary prehistory; — our biological properties are neither good nor bad; only that which is the result of a choice between different possibilities can be evaluated as good or bad; we cannot choose our own biological nature; — social norms are the product of social evolution, which is far more rapid than biological evolution; in social evolution, goal-setting, planning, and the borrowing of properties foreign in origin are possible (to a certain degree); — social norms can be ethically evaluated in terms of the accepted norms and goals that society sets for itself; — the experience of happiness is one of the functions of our biological nature; this state is attainable only when the biological and social natures operate without contradicting each other; — a fairly wide diversity of sexual practices is characteristic of the human being and of related species; — in the course of the emergence of our genus and, in all probability, our species, the level of sexual activity characteristic of us increased substantially; our sexuality sustains the social structures that are specific to us; — natural reproduction in humans and in many other bisexual species is possible exclusively as the result of interaction between male and female individuals; — in humans and in other bisexual species, individuals not included in heterosexual relations (including true homosexuals) are thereby excluded from reproduction; — sexual development and the formation of sex-specific social roles in the human being is a complex process dependent on genetic factors, intra-uterine influences, and cultural forces; — parochial altruism — encompassing the readiness to sacrifice oneself out of love for “one’s own” and out of hatred for “strangers” — was an important factor that influenced the evolution of human behaviour; — our biological programmes, which evolved during the period when humanity was divided into antagonistic groups, readily attach themselves to a variety of markers that enable the sorting of “our own” from “strangers”; — in groups split into “our own” and “strangers,” the realisation of basic biological and social programmes is disrupted, and the possibility of a happy life within them is narrowed or disappears entirely. I hope the picture I am describing is more or less clear. Let me add several comments. The social “storey” grows out of the biological and is to some degree independent of it. Throughout human history, humanity has tried many ways of governing biological nature in the service of lofty ideas. Children’s heads were compressed with pots so that they would acquire a beautiful shape (in the opinion of connoisseurs); the genitals of girls were mutilated with stone knives so that women would derive no pleasure from sex; the elderly, the mentally ill, and members of inferior races were destroyed in the name of the nation’s health or a radiant future. Advocates of certain forms of sexuality who stigmatise advocates of other forms frequently speak of “abomination.” When the subject is someone else’s choice that does not concern you, such labels are inadmissible. But violence against biological nature, its mutilation, its forcing into ideological moulds — that is indeed an abomination. I am convinced that only a society can be stable in which social norms do not intrude uninvited into biology — with one (but very important) exception: medicine. The boundary between medicine and interference in private life should be drawn by the presence or absence of a request from the individual for such intervention, or by the presence or absence of a threat to others (in the case of infectious diseases). On the other hand, social norms can be sufficiently independent of the biological substrate. Let me give an example. We are probably biologically prepared to grasp the ideas of “my apple” and “your apple,” “our territory” and “our neighbours’ territory.” Yet there are no archetypes within us for “my share of the factory’s stock” or “your savings account.” Detailed private-property law is a social invention. Social practice has conducted a series of experiments in which comparable territories tested the effectiveness of different norms regarding private property (Finland versus the Pskov region; East Germany versus West Germany; North Korea versus South Korea; China versus Taiwan; and so on). We can observe that respect for private property promotes the normal development of human groups and opens up broader possibilities for the happy lives of their members. Such social norms can therefore be considered good. Norms that recognise equal rights for different people, irrespective of their biological characteristics, must also be considered good. At the level of biology there is no equality whatsoever — we are all fundamentally different. It is impossible to equalise the fitness (that is, the chances of survival and leaving offspring) of a two-year-old boy, a twenty-year-old girl, a forty-year-old man, and an eighty-year-old woman. Yet the task of social norms should be to combat the inequality (and all the more the antagonism) of different groups of people. Otherwise things will get worse for everyone. One of the spheres in which our biological nature breaks into our social life is sexuality. A person guided by cultural norms may find it difficult to manage. Do you know how much unhappiness arose, for example, from the fact that a young man knew he was supposed to desire happiness for the working people of the world, yet felt that for some reason (probably owing to his own imperfection) he wanted to do strange things with girls (or with other young men)? It would have been half the trouble if he were drawn to a specific citizen with whom he was supposed to form a family as the basic unit of society. As ill luck would have it, indecent desires visited him on the most varied occasions and in connection with the most varied individuals! What can such a conflict lead to? To repression, for example, when unacceptable desires are declared non-existent. They do not disappear anywhere and manifest themselves in behaviour at the most unexpected moment, leaving the consciousness (which stubbornly refuses to acknowledge ideologically unacceptable desires) in an absurd position. The person ceases to trust himself, begins to struggle against his “baser” nature, and ultimately collapses into the role of an unhappy moralist who loses battle after battle with himself. Now the time has come to turn to the topic of homosexuality, which prompted this discussion. Let us apply the concept of norm established in the previous column: the norm is that which is maintained by selection. At the individual level, true homosexuality cannot be a norm (there is no need to cite the international classification of diseases — that is an entirely different matter!). But the version that a certain proportion of homosexuals can be maintained by group selection should not be dismissed. And how is the social norm to be established? Let us recall that sexual orientation is a marker closely bound to biology that can split society into “our own” and “strangers.” Killings, and certainly various forms of discrimination against those who are socially different, are not rare in recent history. I believe that each of us has an interest in living in a society where no characteristic of a person that is closely tied to biology can become the basis for social discord. I would apply this especially to sexual characteristics. Read Desmond Morris’s The Naked Ape: there are weighty grounds for asserting that the striving for intimacy, for privacy during expressions of sexuality, is one of our innate programmes. It is precisely this that is transgressed by noisy gay-pride parades displaying homoeroticism. On the other hand, if a person feels he cannot live in a world where gay people have the right to kiss in the street, the cause lies not in gay people; the cause lies in the moralist’s suppressed desires and his distrust of himself. So should gay people be permitted to kiss in the street? There is no need to prohibit it. Every society establishes a threshold for which manifestations of private life are permissible to display publicly and which are not. And a reasonable person, regardless of his orientation, will not flaunt his intimate functions to a degree that makes those around him uncomfortable. And so. The individual norm is heterosexuality (and possibly bisexuality as well). The group norm is, in all likelihood, the presence of a certain proportion of bisexual and homosexual individuals. The social norm is non-interference by society and other citizens in matters of the sexual life (and other characteristics closely bound to biology) of individuals. A certain degree of restraint in the public display of one’s intimate expressions is probably part of the individual norm; a degree of disapproval of excessive openness is part of the social norm. From this point of view, a prohibition on homosexual propaganda without a prohibition on everything else that can influence the sexual development of young people is one form of discrimination. It is not prohibited to produce and broadcast films that advertise violence (including violence associated with heterosexual relations). It is not prohibited to propagandise religious dogmas, including those that condemn expressions of sexuality. It is not prohibited to disseminate ideologies that distort conceptions of human nature and of the universe. It is not prohibited to conscript young men into the army, placing them in a rigidly hierarchical environment permeated with homosexual metaphors. Yet homosexual propaganda has been singled out for special prohibition by specific laws! Laws against the propaganda of homosexuality are discriminatory, ineffective, and foolish. They contradict the interests of heterosexuals as much as they do those of homosexuals. Have you already decided that I am an advocate for sexual minorities? Wait. Fairness requires acknowledging that discrimination can run in the opposite direction as well. Thanks to Golubitsky I came to understand an example I had read about before. Imagine: in France, an extremist organisation has been created that believes children are born only to a father and a mother. Its emblem is indecent: a man and a woman with children. This emblem reminds sexual minorities that in a biological respect they differ from heterosexuals. A person who dared to appear in public with such an offensive symbol is arrested! This discrimination, too, affects the interests not only of heterosexuals but of homosexuals as well. Consider: it is an absurd, arbitrary attempt to steer human nature, grounded in dubious ideas. Attempts to adjust biology through policing can lead to nothing good. Are you troubled by the possibility of homosexual marriages? It is obvious that people may dispose of their property rights and social entitlements. Whether to call a same-sex union a family (a word reflecting the outcome of the evolution of heterosexual relations) is a matter of taste. Are you troubled by the possibility of homosexuals adopting children? If such a decision is taken to improve the life of a child (who, for example, moves from the unnatural environment of a children’s institution into the somewhat unnatural situation of a same-sex family) and there is no other way to improve that child’s life, it seems to me to be permissible. If the adoption of children is meant to compensate for the fact that the sexual orientation of the adopters places them in a different position compared to a traditional family, it is a futile exercise that is cruel to the children. Is the child in such an adoption an end or a means? Do you agree with me? Then do not support any attempts at discrimination, whether harsh or mild, whether directed in one direction or the other. And only then will we acquire the full moral right to oppose schemes aimed at instilling in children the idea that heterosexual relations are merely one unremarkable variant among a rainbow diversity of forms of sex. And when we resist attempts to remove from nursery schools fairy tales that mention boys and girls, men and women (replacing them with educational texts about homosexuals and transvestites), our actions will not reflect double standards. And we shall be guided in this by sound reason and natural-science knowledge, not by myths grown on ideological soil. ← Dmitry Shabanov → On the humanities and natural-science approach to an explosive topic: a discussion of the causes of homosexual behaviour Social Utopia: how an unbiased, ideology-free society should treat the diversity of manifestations of human sexuality A specific regulatory mechanism or selection? Discussion of one hypothesis on the reproductive mechanisms of interspecific hybrids of green frogs Column for Computerra #108 Column for Computerra #109 Column for Computerra #110