Re: Sociocultural aspects of human sexuality

Why do people actually waste their lives following a status quo that they themselves had no part in creating?

That's an easy one. People have a natural tendency to continue with the status quo - at least, most of the time - because it works.

That is to say, conservatism is - or at least, has been throughout the great majority of human evolutionary history - a good thing. While traditions are usually not optimal, they have at least stood the test of time - they have worked well enough and not gotten their practitioners all killed.

Of course, too much conservatism is a bad thing - the overly conservative tribe is quickly outmatched by the tribe which allows some innovation - yet too much innovation - too much focus on new, unproven ideas at the expense of old, proven ways, can also lead to disaster. As a result, successful societies are mostly conservative but with some members willing to try new things.

We can see this at work even in the movements that have led to our current situation. Many of us figure that an unholy alliance of Bible-believing Christians and Feminists are responsible for the hatred that is directed towards us, and I believe this is largely true - but one of these trends (Feminism) is precisely a case of a good idea gone too far, and the other trend (resurgent religiosity) was a reaction to changes to the status quo that were variously harmful or at least unsettling.

In short, the 1960s were a time when a great deal of change was needed and a great deal of change happened - but while some of those trends were good (equality for blacks, women, and queers; new technology, greater emphasis on creative thinking in education) other trends were neutral or bad (the "new math", new ideas on teaching reading, certain excesses of the civil rights movement such as affirmative action and forced busing, some economic policies, some excesses of feminism, and polyester clothing). As it happens, one of those excesses of feminism - the idea that all women and children were victims of men - dovetailed nicely with a twisted understanding of traditional religion to produce a very bad effect in which children and most men became the new underclass to be reviled and controlled. Of course, these excesses in turn led to new problems, which I suspect may be in turn overturned soon in a new orgy of creative destruction. I hope that we will have learned from past experience and make this transition a bit easier than the last one - but even so there will probably be at least a few bad ideas mixed with the good, which will eventually lead to a need for more change somewhere down the road.

That is the nature of things, and while we can wish that people would be smart enough and independent enough to think for themselves the fact is that most can or do not, and society as a whole is generally better off when such people stick to established norms than when they attach themselves to every new cause no matter how nutty. (For example, many people around the world are beginning to notice the problems with the government of the United States, but a good portion of those believe in some pretty crazy conspiracy theories rather than acknowledging that most of the problems are simply due to incompetence or petty corruption.)

And so, most people stick to the status quo - because, despites its problems, it mostly works.