Are Men Useful For Anything Other Than Gamete Production?

I have an XY chromosome pair. I say this only as a fact. When I consider the species to which I belong, I can’t help but wonder what possible use the 50-ish percent of us with that particular genetic trait have other than to provide a necessary component for procreation?

As I consider the world, past and present, in which we live, I can’t help but see that many of our ills are mostly due to men trying to make themselves relevant (or, conversely, to marginalize the distaff side to create the illusion of relevancy). I’ve struggled for years, nay decades, on this problem and the only conclusion I’ve been able to reach is that males just aren’t all that useful at all. If anything, they are a liability.

Generally speaking, things pretty much boil down to being able to gestate, birth, and lactate babies. With that uniquely female ability that perpetuates the species, beyond the contribution of genetic material, I’m hard-pressed to find anything that males are capable of that women aren’t also capable of.

Some will argue that men are better at spatial reasoning. That might be true, but it isn’t the exclusive province of males. Plenty of women can equal or better their male counterparts.

Strength and innate athletic ability are their defining traits, others contend. True, the effects of testosterone on the maturing male convey skeletal mechanical advantages that equate with greater strength, speed, and agility compared with similarly-size women. I think that’s more than compensated for with intelligence. Even relatively simple contrivances: levers, pulleys, block-and-tackles, etc. can more than compensate for any biologic difference.

The ability to support a family is sometimes cited as a reason, but women through the ages have shown that they are more than able to fend for themselves whenever their men have been away for extended periods.

When pouring through argument after argument, I could only find one thing that men were of some marginal use: they are expendable. Because it only takes one man to fertilize a town (he might be very tired man), all of the rest are little more than feasts for the beasts.

We see in many mammalian species the separation of males and females except during breeding season. The females fend for themselves and their offspring. The males try to figure out who gets to breed. In the end, it pretty much boils back down to the males only being of practical use for their chromosomes.

This is why it’s tough for me to see the abuses men inflict on women. Whether it is physical, mental, societal, theological, or whatever. It’s all geared to one thing: to make men feel as if they have more power in the grand scheme of things than they really do. Frankly, I’m really surprised that women let them get away with as much as they do. It confounds me no end.

I can’t help almost cheering those scattered species (sharks, frogs, etc.) where some females have demonstrated an ability to breed spontaneously with no male intervention whatsoever. Of course, that is no way to fruitfully multiply. There needs to be a genetic exchange for enhanced genome survivability. In a science fiction novel I wrote, I created a uni-sexual species where a mating pair exchanged their same-sex gametes…which of the pair would gestate a fertilized “egg” was then just up to chance. Thus, there was neither male nor female, but there was still genetic mixing (and a reason why I had to create genderless pronouns).

So…women around the world: if you want to take over, I have absolutely no argument against it. I don’t necessarily think the world will be any more or less screwed up in the long term (screwing up stuff seems to be a human trait), but you should definitely take your shot. I hope that you will be merciful and just to we Y-chromes. It may be a man’s world now; not because it was destined to be, but because y’all let them (us) have it. See…I said you were capable of screwing things up, too.