The way I imagine it, at the most base level, selecting your kid's genes (while creepy and eugenics-y and not at all something I endorse for non-medical reasons) is not necessarily that different than selecting an attractive person to mate with (or a sperm donor who describes his looks as something that sounds like it might mix well with your own genetic offerings). No one heads out to the bars and seeks out a mediocre person, or even a downright ugly one to take home that night. We all head for the people who strike us as attractive (whatever that means to you). And naturally, when expecting a child, no one hopes for their future bundle of joy to be ugly or disfigured in some way that will impede their growth or socialization: shallow or not, we all want attractive, smart kids. And we want to find good lookin' people to make them with.
But my question is: is this desire natural? Or is it learned?
I wholeheartedly think what we conceive of as attractive is often socialized bullshit, but some things seem to be based in a natural desire to find someone who will give our offspring a chance of surviving. So while I might pick the brunette girl with a thick ass or the guy with broad shoulders and someone else might find those features off-putting, the exact traits that make you weak in the knees are almost arbitrary. The really important urge is that the prospective partner is someone who seems healthy looking and reasonably attractive in the purely genetic sense (symmetrical figures, "average" sized, the like), an urge might very well be "natural." But as we are no longer living in the woods, fighting for our survival with our brains and bodies alone, does it make sense that we extrapolate this "natural" urge to raw attractiveness alone?
Just some half-formed thoughts congealing as I write a final paper on gamete donation. Gimmie your more intelligent comments!
Much love,
The Sheriff
Oh, and happy December!
I think it would be really odd to grow up knowing that you look the way you do because your parents made a conscious decision and paid for you to look that way. I mean above and beyond corrective surgeries and the like- but look at the intersex movement and opponents of circumcision for evidence that what parents and a doctor might think of as "correcting a problem" can seriously fuck with a person's development as a whole being. I have a feeling that knowing I was designed to be hot when I grew up would seriously seriously fuck with my head. Perhaps people who know that their mom or dad was purely a trophy spouse have a similar complex already, I don't know.
ReplyDeleteBeauty standards shift several times within a generation. Thick dark eyebrows, or large breasts, or extreme thinness, or whatever they insert in your gene code, might be "in" when you're conceived, and "out" by the time you're a teenager.
I just see a lot of resentment and psychological trauma resulting from this.
I agree on all counts!
ReplyDelete-Sheriff