I did write both of those things — and I should clarify that in a modern society women can fuck whoever they want, or nobody at all if they prefer — and nobody of either sex owes anybody anything.

But that’s a cultural construct of our modern society, you can argue that it’s been constructed by men, but I don’t think that’s true. If it were just left to the basic instinctual drive of men — then men would have outright war with women functioning as little more than a resource. Instead I think there’s a compelling argument to be made about a Darwinian arms race between the sexes in which the sexually selected factor is intelligence and competence. Monogamy is an emergent factor of sexual selection — despite the fact that it goes against most male impulses.

If we’ve moved past that (and I’m not convinced we have) — then there is no sexual selection to be done any more. Men can simply be harvestable sperm banks for women to dip into. If that’s the case then I’d expect there to be a violent cultural backlash — I think it has already begun in earnest the darkest recesses of the internet.

Women don’t owe men sex we can agree on. But what stops men taking it? The veneer of civilisation and civilised man is wafer thin. Look what happens to incidence of rape when the rules of society break down. The average war zone is not a good place to be for any woman — and framing this as a war between men and women will lead to the weaponisation of rape and sexual assault. Dehumanisation by either side doesn’t bode well.

Perhaps beta men will be happy fucking each other. Perhaps there are women who are happy with a Turkey baster and a small pot. I suspect that is not the case. Our sexual proclivities were formed in tandem as a species, expressed in a myriad of ways through culture and won’t be easily overturned.

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And on the falling birthrate…. my original comment was a little glib. I’m fairly convinced that Capitalism is on the way out for the reasons you’ve outlined. Capitalism generally only works if you continue to expand the model and continue to grow to create new capital to share and distribute.

That entire plan went to shit when we started controlling the birth rates — birth rates are falling and so economic prosperity is going to falter and fall over eventually. The planet (as in the lump of rock with environmental factors etc) may breathe a sigh of relief. Covid-19 may have hastened the demise of capitalism a little earlier than anticipated, but we’d better get thinking about what sort of world we want post-capitalism.

Thanks for carrying on the discussion :o)