I find the explanations of evolutionists very dubious. Critics who claim they are "just so stories" are right on the mark. Example? For decades they claimed the reason men had beards was to keep their faces warm in winter. Now they're saying the real reason is to whisk sweat away in summer. Which is it? Summer or winter?
Another roll-your-eyes-up-in-your-head explanation I ran across recently is for what we un-PC-types refer to as "babbling females." Everyone who is honest about it knows most – but not all – women have an abnormally large babble-part to their brains (which I suspect takes the place of the part of their brains that knows how to do anything less than a 15-point parallel park). Why? I don't have a clue, and neither does anyone else.
To be fair, I'll point out that men have a babble-part to their brains, too. Some men have one bigger than most women. I'm one of them. I have male friends who babble so much that in the middle of a conversation, they will stop and say, "Now where was I going with this?" I am, however, talking about generalities: most women babble a lot more than most men.
The explanation for women's babbletude, which I decided was ridiculous after about two second's thought, is to keep tigers and bears from eating them while they were gathering nuts and berries. Supposedly the talking was to scare away predators that would otherwise munch on them.
Hmm. Could be, I suppose. Although if I was a tiger searching for a meal, and I heard a bunch of women talking, I would think, "Note to self: snacks! And lots of them!"
My conclusion as to the truth of this theory: oh, pooh.
Another theory I ran across recently about the purpose of yakking was to emotionally bond. With whom? Other women? It sure isn't with men. Men are driven nuts by women who won't shut up.
There! I said it! Listen up, girls! Men do not bond through non-stop babbling! It's why they sit in the recliner in the evening with their eyes glazed! They're trying to tune everything out. Male and female brains are different! It's about time everyone ignored all those left-wing feminists (whether male or female), admit the differences (which everyone knew in the recent past) and deal with them!
It's not like they're such horrible differences that will cause eternal enmity between men and women, the way feminists want. These differences can even be joked about. Like this:
For a few months I used to eat dinner every night, at her house, with a woman I knew. This is essentially how it went:
Woman: Babble babble babble.
Me: Uh huh.
Woman: Babble babble babble.
Me: Yeah, I know.
Woman: Babble babble babble.
Me (falling face first into my bowl of Cap'n Crunch): Uh.
Woman: Babble babble babble.
Me: Burble.
Woman: Babble babble babble.
Anyone who is also honest knows that most women have SHOPPING and ON SALE stamped on their DNA. Those who don't believe this are invited to get in between women and a bin of ON SALE shoes. It's entirely possible you could have your arms ripped out of their sockets.
The evolutionary explanation I heard for shopping also had to do with nuts and berries. When women shop it's just a modern version of gathering food. The first question that occurred to me: what do buying shoes and Beanie Babies have to do with collecting nuts and berries? Answer: nothing.
And nuts and berries are free! Which are then supposed to be eaten. How does that explain a woman I know, who paid for "about 100" Beanie Babies, which she keeps in a box under her bed? ("His name is Tangles, he's a kitty, and he's so cute!") I can imagine some evolutionist, pontificating in all seriousness: "Well, the Beanie Babies do represent nuts, which she is storing in a safe place to eat later." What is she, a squirrel? And she's not going to eat the Beanie Babies, which, unlike nuts and berries, are certainly not free. Does this theory apply to closets full of shoes? The Beanie Babies represent nuts and the shoes represent berries? Puhleeze. A break from this silliness, okay?
For that matter, if men were supposed to evolve as hunters, wouldn't all men like shopping? Isn't shopping just a form of hunting? Instead, all the men I know can't stand to shop. I can't walk through a mall for more than 15 minutes without this strange fatigue coming over me, one that sends me to the nearest bench (if I can find one that isn't occupied by some other guy trying to desperately recharge his batteries).
Someday, some genius is going to realize the way to make an easy multi-million is to open a place in a mall were all the men can gather while the women shop. They'll be able to drink a beer, smoke a cigar, and watch sports on TV. It won't have tables and chairs, just recliners. I would call it, "The Boy's Treehouse," and put a sign out front: "No Gurls Allowed."
We can leave out being served by nubile young women, since this would cause a lot of problems when the shoppers were finished and came to retrieve the non-shoppers. Instead the servers could be nice mom-types who might even serve chicken-noodle soup if one of the boys wasn't feeling so hot.
If malls aren't going to allow these male gathering places, the least they can do is have lots of comfortable couches and chairs instead of those hard, straight-backed benches. Lots of couches and chairs.
What kind of evolutionary theory can explain women spending two hours wandering through half the stores in a mall while men go in one store and out in 15 minutes? Shouldn't it be the other way around – the men hunting through the mall while the women gather together to enbabble each other?
The whole evolution-explains-everything belief is just a little bit ridiculous. In 1,000,000 B.C. did Og lie on a pile of furs in his cave watching the fire while his wife complained, "Why don't you talk to me?" Somehow, I doubt it.
Okay, Richard Dawkins and all you other hard-core evolutionists – I'm all ears. I'll wait as long as necessary for an explanation. I'm sure there will be one forthcoming very soon. I'm also sure it won't make any sense, just like Dawkins' fairy-tale about flying squirrels evolving by regular squirrels crashing headfirst into the ground, leaving the jumpier squirrels around to sprout wing-flaps.
In the meantime, summer's coming. I think I'll grow a beard.
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