Men, amiright?

As a man, I’m feeling a cold breath on my neck. It’s breath from the same mouth that hovered over palm pilots, rotary telephones and spats: it’s the breath of obsoletism.

As early as the late 1700’s, there were experiments in artificial insemination in humans, notably done by John Hunter, a Scottish surgeon. This was the first step to making men completely obsolete. The only thing we men had going for us was the production of life-juice! We’d already ransacked every corner of the world, centuries before, for who knows what reason, now there wasn’t even going to be the excuse that we were needed to make babies. Why would we do this to ourselves and each other? An example of this ill-advised procedure came in 1884. An American physician by the name of William Pancoast artificially inseminated a woman, by her and her husband's request, who gave birth to a child nine months later, as expected. However, this married woman was not aware that she was pregnant any of the nine months. Pancoast had gone rogue, taking the liberty of artificially inseminating the woman while he had her under anesthesia. Who wouldn’t have done the same in similar circumstances? That’s a rhetorical question, of course. I'm not sure why it was so urgent that he couldn't even wait until she was awake. Even the wildest ape, straight from the jungle, would’ve thought, “Where am I?” and would have promptly left the hospital, leaving Mrs. Surprise-Baby un-impregnated, without her knowing it. He's an example of someone eager to wipe men from the face of Earth.

That’s just the reproduction side of the coin of uses for male humans. The other is the perpetuation and advancement of society, in which men have been taking the lead, at least since the earliest records of history. Or, more likely, men have just taken credit for it. I mean, we all know that mothers have had the greatest influence on societies around the world. This, however, is not my point. I need to mention that evolution suggests those individuals within a species that put themselves in the danger, on purpose, are doing so as a means of eliminating themselves for the benefit of the species. Crazy, right? Most of these individuals are the men I mentioned before, who have been killing themselves and each other in droves the last few thousand years. What men are left haven’t improved on the situation. When one considers, though, that these are members of our species whom are literally killing themselves to save the rest of us, it becomes clear that men are most definitely becoming obsolete, as evidenced by their deadly actions. It’s a slow self-cleansing, of sorts; an auto-genocidal cycle. Men, as a collective whole, are telling the world that, in order for society to finally advance, most men will need to die, preferably at the hands of other men.

Advancements in technology terrify me, due to this train of thought. Advancements in the medical field are even more terrifying! Why are men inching closer to creating fully humanoid robots if it’s not to eventually step aside and let the androids take over? Why do men keep improving weapons if it’s not to more quickly eliminate each other, in a more effective, wide-scale manner? Why did us men create the process of cotton-picking artificial insemination if we weren’t trying to make us completely unnecessary?!

Even in the world of entertainment, especially video games, men are killing each other. All the time! They even go out of their way to get their friends to kill other guys, as a team, and then kill each other. You can’t watch a television show or movie that involves mostly men without some of them dying, usually at the hands of other men. You can’t read anything that involves mostly men and avoid these same themes.

And, beyond technology, medicine and entertainment, you will notice these same types of men are most likely against social progress, as well. The men who are content to remain ignorant, undecided or unexamined fit in this category of self-destructive behavior. Who is more dangerous than a man who thinks of himself as an exception to social progress? That same man will always have followers, and those followers will also have followers. Pretty soon, you have misinformation and calculated division, kindled, ultimately, by this same man. It’s only until the process stops, from within, that these people can be saved from themselves, and from the false-shepherd. An organism which stops moving and growing will die, and neglecting the progress of social change will lead to this same death, socially. Actively going against what will propel a social unit to continue to move and grow is the same kind of self-destruction as murder and/or suicide.

I don’t want to become obsolete as a human man. How can I possibly go against the ebb and flow of this eventuality, though? It seems like it’s only a matter of time until I get killed by a cyborg, or a stray bullet. Maybe even by poisoned air, or water. Or worse: from a hideous spattering of nanny-nanny boo-boo's. Whichever way, it’s all the same fear. I didn’t sign up for this role to be placed in my genes before birth--I would like to change my personal destiny, if I can, but I’ve already shown signs of the sickness. And, if there’s ever a medicine to cure the disease of male stupidity, I’m afraid I’ll be too stupid to take it.