Have the coming of female economical independence sparked a change in which gender is naturally sexually displaying and advertising suitability?
It is my theory that due to a number of factor women are in the process of becoming the displaying gender in the human species. This process probably started quite far back, probably as early as first successes with agriculture.
The way I see it men are the natural displaying gender in the human species. They have thicker more vibrant hair, they are slightly bigger, they engage in risky behavior, they can grow beards, and baldness have been connected to higher levels of testosterone. A lot of factors indicate that the human male used visual effects to advertise his superior suitability to mates.
As humans began living in larger settlements such as towns and cities there has been a gradual out phasing of male dominant behavior and male sexual advertising, possibly as a result of very dominant males killing each other off over time. Especially during the middle ages in Europe, aggressive men were regularly culled in wars, giving men with a less pronounced masculine behavior a slight advantage in passing on their genes. Along side this you see a general tendency of the ruling class to control what kind of clothes people of lower classes were wearing. In Rome only the nobility could wear purple, in the middle ages only royalty could wear ermine. This could be interpreted to the ruling classes seeking to monopolise on the best forms of sexual advertisement.
In the general male population you have a gradual muting of any visual displays of suitability.
How ever the ability to support one or several women who doesn't have to work for themselves remains a way of demonstrating suitability in relation to other men. This also plays an important part in males claiming their place in the social hierarchy.
It could be claimed that, as women have always had their own social hierarchy in relation to each other, that landing the best man has always been very important to establishing ones place there. So far so good.
But what is happening when young women are displaying sexually with basis in their own income?
Today gaudy, sparkly, colorful displays are associated with women. Women are the visually displaying ones. Women are the ones whose appearance is being judged. This is often seen as male controlling behavior, trying to keep women down. I believe there is a lot to that perspective.
I think there might be something really interesting happening with our species, I don't think whether it is good or bad is an interesting question, but I think it can be helpful to investigate this perspective.
A perspective that basically puts women in vertigo inducing heals, in the same category as male deers with ridiculously huge antlers. Both are demonstrating that they can survive and prosper even with a "handicap". This might have been born out of attempts of men to display through the women, but women are now doing it independently, both in trying to attract males and in navigating social hierarchies.
I'll try to use this blog to untangle some of these ideas, pose more questions and investigate the changes occurring in the human species.
