Sexual liberation was the threat or promise of my 1960s adolescence. In the 1980s, when my children were young, it was hard to shield them from pornography, amoral sex “education” and psychobabble about unhealthy repressions. Yet now the censorious seem as strong as ever, persecuting suspected offenders and dubiously crying while properly decrying rape. The criterion of consensuality made morality, of a sort, enforceable. Yet the extent and speed of the reversal in sexual mores still seems surprising.
As David Barash points out in “Out of Eden: The Surprising Consequences of Polygamy,” the free lovers of the 1960s grew up into mild serial monogamists. His book does not explain why, but it does subvert evolutionary explanations for promiscuity and recommend cultural checks to restrain it. “Polygamy is our tortoise,” the author assures us gnomically, “monogamy our hare.” He means that nature gave humans—especially males—a long-formed, lingering propensity to “sexual gallivanting,” but a monogamous culture can outpace our biology. Yet the tortoise, in the story, beat the hare, while Mr. Barash hopes social responsibility can triumph over bodily urges.
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