Archive for the ‘childbirth’ Category
on sex, consent, offspring and bonobos
So all this Epstein/Maxwell/Trump stuff has been dominating the news, even here to some extent, and it obviously raises questions more generally about sex, power and all that pabulum. In my novel In Elizabeth, published centuries ago, I described how the main character, Danny, was, on his 16th birthday, asked by his 14-year old girlfriend, Anne-Marie (let’s call her), if he wanted to have sex with her. A gift. She was the most beautiful girl Danny had ever seen, and she assured him that she had done it before. So they did it, on Anne-Marie’s parents’ double bed. The whole thing lasted only a few minutes, with the removal of as few clothes as possible, and was interrupted by her little brother, whom she was baby-sitting. “Ummm, I’m telling mum’, he said. Fortunately, he was talked out of it, and yes, this was autobiographical.
I had no idea at the time whether what we were doing was legal or not, and frankly couldn’t have cared less. I should also say that my sex life was pretty well all downhill from there.
Much later, after this novel was published, a fellow teacher, who had read it, questioned me about this sex scene. Was it really true, she asked, looking mildly disturbed. That was perhaps the first time I ever considered the ethics or legality of the situation. Even so, I didn’t bother to look into it. As to Anne-Marie, very shortly afterwards, she abandoned me for a much bigger kid who, seeing her beauty, kept forcing me into ‘play fights’ in which, of course, he bested me. I was never built to be an alpha (though my studies have taught me that the alpha doesn’t have to be the biggest). I never saw Anne-Marie again. I hope she did all right, she was nice.
So now I’m looking into those legalities, and I’ve learned about Romeo and Juliet clauses. AI again:
In Australian states with Romeo and Juliet clauses, also known as close-in-age exemptions, consensual sexual activity between teenagers of similar ages is not criminalised, even if they are below the general age of consent. These clauses exist to recognize that adolescent sexual development is a natural process. The specific age differences allowed under these clauses vary by jurisdiction, but generally allow for a maximum age gap of two years.
the legislation in all states and territories states that children and young people below the age of consent are not considered by law to have the capacity to consent, even if the other requirements for consent appear to be met (e.g. understanding what activity they are agreeing to, voluntarily agreeing to or suggesting sexual activity without being coerced or intimidated, communicating their agreement)
So, considering that both Anne-Marie and I were under 17, we didn’t have the legal capacity to consent to what we both consented to, but since there was no sexual assault involved, the act, which occurred a little over 53 years ago, would not be pursued in criminal or civil terms due to statute of limitations provisions. And yet we did both consent, being really quite capacious for our age, if not quite legally.
Again, the age of consent in Germany is 14, but understandably there are conditions attached, relating to age differences and any sign of coercion. But what I remember reading, and I do hope it’s true, is that sex education is a vital part of their school curriculum. This of course should be a feature of every country’s education system, as well as the availability of contraceptives.
This isn’t an issue for bonobos of course. Humans can get pregnant all year round, unlike other apes and animals generally. Can’t something be done to make us less fertile? And while we’re at it, to make us less combative and more bonobosexual? Wouldn’t it be great if such a word caught on. Join the bonobosexual club. Mutual masturbation is their theme, and they seem to be built for it. Meanwhile, in those parts of humanity turned backward by religion, it’s a crime to have any sex outside of marriage, that weird invention.
Not a problem in Elizabeth, though, the town of my youth. The problem there was ignorance, or innocence. Young teens following their instincts, then getting pregnant. A massive, life-changing experience. That was in the seventies, and I can only hope that teachers and parents are now educating their kids about rumpy-pumpy consequences.
Anyway, out of all this, the mystery of our unique proneness to pregnancy (the Guinness Book of Records claims the highest number of births to one individual is 69, in 27 confinements – as if – and there are claims almost as unbelievable), is something I’d like to explore. Bonobos and chimps generally give birth to no more than five or six little ones in a lifetime. It’s all to do with hormones, pheromones and being ‘in season’. Why are human animals so different? When did that happen? What about Neanderthals, and earlier hominins?
To be continued, perhaps…
childbirth, population, bonobos
A BBC pic from June 2021. This woman supposedly gave birth to ten, five by caesarian section, a new world record apparently. But it was all faked, it seems.
Given the craziness of that outlier nation of the WEIRD world, the USA, with its religious anti-intellectualism (in some states) and those states’ consequent ‘every sperm is sacred’ approach to abortion, I’m taken back to my childhood reading of the Guiness Book of Records, an extremely popular work published annually from 1955. My edition would’ve been from the 70s, but today’s internet may have rendered the collection virtually obsolete, methinks. Anyway, I recall being fascinated by the most grotesque facts, including – of course – the woman who gave birth to the most children. I don’t recall the number in my edition, but presumably this was the woman, and the number:
The greatest officially recorded number of children born to one mother is 69, to the wife of Feodor Vassilyev (b. 1707–c.1782), a peasant from Shuya, Russia. In 27 confinements she gave birth to 16 pairs of twins, seven sets of triplets and four sets of quadruplets. Although this seems to be a statistically unlikely story, numerous contemporaneous sources exist which suggest that it is true. The case was reported to Moscow by the Monastery of Nikolsk on 27 February 1782, which had recorded every birth.
My heart goes out to this woman, especially considering that, after all this enormous suffering, she isn’t even given her own name. Perhaps they didn’t bother giving names to women in Russia in them days – though to be fair, Catherine II, aka the Great, was Empress at the time.
Anyway, I remain extremely skeptical that any woman (okay, her name was Valentina), never mind her children, would survive such trauma (are the dates given above those of Feodor or his victim? – it’s unclear), and as for the husband, who went on to have a second wife (at the same time??!!) who gave birth to 18 kids via 8 confinements, what can be said…?
Happy to be a skeptic. Anyway, such records, fact or fiction, are unlikely to be repeated, partly because no woman, even in the most ultra-patriarchal remnants of the world, would put up with being so put-upon. As for kids these days, we’re learning to put quality before quantity methinks. Remember The population bomb? Apparently, this and other doomsday tracts of the late 60s and early 70s led to significant pressure for men and women to be sterilised in India in the following decade or so, as well as China’s One Child policy. But Ehrlich’s doomsday scenario, which he later described as a warning rather than a prediction, never eventuated, though it may have had some small influence on humanity’s slowing growth rate. My own view, when I consider the negative population growth of South Korea and Japan, and Australia’s fairly stable population in recent times, is that this is hardly a bad thing. If countries want to boost their populations, there’s always immigration, which, IMHO, has been a massive boon here in Oz. If nations prefer to be insular, along with negative growth, that’s surely their problem. I’m sure they’ll manage.
In any case, in the WEIRD world, especially among the relatively well-off, we’re having fewer children. Contraception and other resources are helping us to plan our families, if we’re making them.
Anyway, let’s forget about humans for a mo, and focus on a much more interesting species – bonobos:
Females bear one infant every five years or so with a gestation period of around eight months. One fascinating and unique behaviour recorded in bonobos happens during birth: other females have been known to gather around the pregnant bonobo and assist in the birth, similar to human midwives.
Bonobos’ low birth-rate is one reason they’re struggling as a species, so breeding in captivity, or in enclosed spaces within their own native regions, has become important. Another reason they’re struggling, though, is the same reason their non-human primate relatives are struggling. The behaviour of humans. Bonobo numbers are very hard to calculate, but here’s how Wikipedia puts it:
Conservation status. The IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) Red List classifies bonobos as an endangered species, with conservative population estimates ranging from 29,500 to 50,000 individuals.
Let’s say 40,000 bonobos. The World Population Clock currently puts the human population at just under 8.2 billion. That means we outnumber bonobos by about 205,000 to one. We’re crowding out so many other primates, not to mention wild mammals in general, and even insects. But considering how excellent an example bonobos set, not only at childbirth, but during child-rearing, feeding time, the whole shebang of collective behaviour, all ultimately resulting from females taking power, we should be doing more than just safeguarding them, we should be taking note of this bonobo sisterhood at a time of unprecedented, and largely man-made, global crisis.
References
Paul Ehrlich, The Population Bomb, 1968
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/book-incited-worldwide-fear-overpopulation-180967499/