Charles Darwin was so hot in his day. So hot. The white, Anglican, cousin-loving (birds too), Victorian-era daddy shattered the illusion that humans are somehow above all the other creatures on this planet. He helped explain—along with a lot of other contemporaries to be fair—how life develops and changes over time, a process that up until the 1800s had no other popular explanation besides “God did it.” His basic theories on the evolution of organisms remain supported by scientific data. Not bad. Many scientists consider his work to be more impactful to the human condition than any other scientific discovery. He didn’t have to do this. He could have enjoyed a comfortable life as a gentleman doctor bleeding people, getting invited to soirees, or whatever it was Victorian gentlefolk got up to. Instead, he toiled away at this research, explained nature to us, and pissed off lots of powerful people. Even though annoying various authorities (religious, monarchic, etc.) wasn’t really his intent, he’s a real dude for doing it. But life is complicated. And this story…. it’s not all good. Nothing ever is. NOTHING. EVER. IS.
Man differs from woman in size, bodily strength, hairyness, &c., as well as in mind, in the same manner as do the two sexes of many mammals.
—Charles Darwin, volume I, chapter I: “The Evidence of the Descent of Man from some Lower Form”
Let us examine the quote above. Sure, there are a lot of sexual differences throughout species, but Charles decides to also include “the mind” in these differences. Why did he throw that in? What’s going on Charlie? Well, he probably included it because he was a white, Anglican, Victorian daddy (see previous paragraph). Was Charles a decent fellow for his time? Yes. He had a lot of good takes for the early 1800s. He opposed human enslavement. Big deal for a white dude at that time. He supported electoral reform. He struggled with a god who would allow evil in the world (not bad). Yet, he was born into a wealthy family and came of age in early Victorian England. As much as Charles resisted or even rejected many of the social norms of his era, it cannot be denied that he was also a product of them (a V. Daddy). He didn’t have much empathy for the working poor and in The Descent of Man he claims that men are superior to women in thought, reason, and imagination. A complicated worldview from a human living in an oppressive, imperial age.
The start of the 19th century marked the highpoint of European colonialism. Things were bad for pretty much anyone not of the rich, white man persuasion. European powers had already carved up and looted the Western hemisphere and were now working on the rest of the world [the United States isn’t called out specifically, as the U.S. is just the evolved monster child of Europe]. Not only did Europeans want to control the world, its people, and its resources, it also wanted to understand them. No. They weren’t knowledge-loving nerds. They were in fact assholes. To fully dominate and exploit something you need to fully understand it. The world had to be mapped, its cultures assessed, its flora and fauna analyzed. (Some of them were legit nerds. Darwin was a nerd with asshole tendencies.) So naturalists got the call by their governments to get out there and learn about what was going on in their looted territories. It helped imperial powers maintain control over their stolen possessions and gave them the tools needed to exploit. Darwin was one of many male (again—bros only, thank you) European scientists who helped shape our understanding of our natural world, but their interpretations were massively influenced by their social background as white “gentlemen.”
Ladies were not invited to sail to the Galapagos to study animals. Ladies were not even supposed to read about animals. These naturalists worked at a time of peak patriarchy, or maybe that’s today—give it a few more years. Either way. Men dominated European society, just as they had in Europe since the birth of Roman civilization—way before the Republic. The foundation of the patriarchal system in Europe can be traced back to the Romans, probably even further but just go with it. They did coin the term after all. Maybe they still hold the crown for peak patriarchy. They probably do. It was brutal for women in the Roman world. And their brutal ideas on the family and the role men and women should play in society were passed down to Europeans through the Christian Church. Thanks so much to everyone involved. And what heaping pile of shit did they bestow upon us?
Romans believed the male head of the household literally owned not just his home and possessions, but also all the people in his family—wife, children, and enslaved people. What did ownership mean to Romans? Well, first and foremost, it meant being a man. Only men could own or be owed. It meant having complete autonomy over something, which according to them meant having the right to destroy it if that’s what you wanted, including your family members. You could say the Romans perfected a society utterly dominated by men. The people who gave us patriarchy also thrust the phallus into our cultural history as a symbol of power and protection. It comes up a lot in their art. It’s hard to miss it. Not surprising given how engorged they were over bro dude domination. The Catholic Church happily carried on these ideas after the fall of the Roman Empire.
The people who gave us patriarchy also thrust the phallus into our cultural history as a symbol of power and protection.
Patriarchal society did not change much in Europe from the fall of Rome in 476 down to 1831 when Darwin set sail on the Beagle to study South American’s biological diversity. It may have been watered down a bit, but not by much. Women held no substantive legal rights in Europe at this time. It was in this patriarchal stew that scientists began to formulate our early understanding of the biological development of the world’s species. We are all products of our societies, for better and for worse. As much as we’d like to think we can escape our upbringing, it’s pretty hard. Darwin was progressive for his time. But he was still of his time. He grew up in the new Roman Empire of its day—the British. Britain’s elite boarding schools glorified Rome. Ideas of male dominance had been drilled into his thinking since he was a child. They were still there as he was sketching iguanas swimming around the Galapagos. They appear throughout his works as evidenced by the quote above.
Darwin and his colleagues’ patriarchal thinking was often reinforced by what they observed. Male and female sexed creatures often do appear differently. They often behave differently. They often have very different motivations. Male animals are often stronger. Often dominate. It’s their natural place in the world. Darwin is often quite good at presenting natural selection as a law with no agency unto itself. Animals evolve due to these laws and the results are the results. Males or females aren’t favored, they just change as natural selection dictates. Yet the writing on animal biology of this era frequently elevates the male species over the female. Male animals have agency in these early narratives, at least in terms of what is described, what is focused on. Female animals are bystanders. Men dominate. It all checks out. Despite their intentions, these naturalists reinforced the idea that the Romans had it right when it came to men and women, and it shaped the discourse of early evolutionary biology.
Despite their intentions, these naturalists reinforced the idea that the Romans had it right when it came to men and women, and it shaped the discourse of early evolutionary biology.
And that sucks because it turns out things are a lot more complicated. Sometimes the bro dudes of this planet don’t dominate. They often don’t matter all that much. Sometimes the female-sexed creatures of the world run things. Sometimes animals are both male and female. Maybe if Darwin and his colleagues had looked a bit closer, had shed their preconceived notions about male-female social roles, they could have seen the full range of feral. It’s not as though biologists adhere to this patriarchy hierarchy today. Science has progressed (somewhat). But most folks aren’t reading the latest peer-reviewed articles in Nature. Many get their ideas from uninformed homo sapiens with podcasts who, due to some success in the entertainment industry, are the go-to source of information on gender, sexuality, evolution, and everything else.
Mate: The Party Game for Feral Naturalists is meant to be a fun and engaging way to reposition the phallus in the popular zeitgeist. It turns out the penis isn’t the most important thing when it comes to biological reproduction, and it sure as hell has no link to power. Female organisms are often far more fascinating than their male counterparts. And, a huge amount of mating occurs without a phallus at all. It’s easy to scrawl a ween on the side of a bathroom stall, it takes almost no effort. And maybe that should tell us all something. Things that take work are usually the things that are more complex, interesting, and rewarding. Mate will help shed light on all of the vulvas, vaginas, and cloacas out there doing their complex and fascinating work on a daily basis. We will learn that Rome had it wrong, it’s often not the dudes with the power (don’t worry, there’s still lots of weens to learn about). And we’ll definitely have fun doing it.