    16

    16

    16

    Fighting For The Privilege of Procreation

    But why all this savagery?  A lot of it springs from a simple

    biological commandment: be fruitful and multiply.

    The gorilla Effie led her friends in the murder of a baby to gain

    an advantage for her offspring.  Livia, mistress of mighty Rome, did

    the same to benefit her sons and their sons after them.   Where violence

    takes place, children crop up over and over again.  Stags fight for the

    right to have them.  Humans declare wars to make the world safe for

    them.  Strange as it sounds, children--and the genes they carry--are one

    key to the mystery of violence.

    An adult male langur who's become the head of the

    establishment ensconces himself at the center of his group looking

    ever-so-regal.  He has every reason for sitting pretty.  If you take a

    closer look at the cluster of langurs milling around him, you'll discover

    that all of them are either his wives or his children.  The females do his

    bidding, and offer their bodies only to him.  If they attempt a romance

    with some dashing bachelor, they are severely punished.  So is the

    hopeful seducer.  No wonder the central male looks so lordly.  He is

    surrounded by a tribe devoted to one primary purpose--having and

    raising his kids.

    As we saw several chapters ago, not every member of the langur

    society is happy about this state of affairs.  In the jungle nearby roams a

    gang of post-pubertal hooligans who have left home permanently to

    hang with toughs their own age.   Their newly spurting sexual

    hormones have triggered the growth of horniness, muscle and a cocky

    aggression.  Periodically, the gang of youthful thugs advances on the

    territory where the well-fixed elder statesman sits in the midst of his

    massive family.  The hoodlums try to get his attention.  They mock and

    <<  <  GO  >  >>