Evolution Devolution Revolution

There’s been much discussion in the media and on social networks lately about breastfeeding and photos of breastfeeding, and whether they should be allowed in any public domain. Well, of course they should, that’s not worthy of even a sentence of debate in my blogosphere. What makes the argument even more ridiculous is that we had a simultaneous debate in the UK about whether national daily newspapers should finally stop featuring page 3 girls, who have continued exposing themselves in public for money and male titillation for decades, with fewer complaints. But I’m not going to enter into a rant about societal misogyny, the sexualisation of women’s breasts, or the hygiene implications of being forced to feed a vulnerable baby in a public toilet, because the thing that saddens me most about it all is the confirmation that our ‘civilised’ society just keeps on pushing humans further and further away from nature, and I really don’t believe that’s a good thing.

The fact that this most natural of human practices is even questioned seems absolutely ludicrous to me. It’s the very thing that makes us mammals and a part of the natural world. Our species could never have survived without it. The fact that we’ve now largely replaced the most nutritious, immune-boosting, perfectly designed substance in the known world with dried chemical substitutes and deemed the delivery of it somehow indecent or offensive is completely absurd. What other animal ever has to hide away from the rest of its kind for simply rearing its young? It’s the fundamental purpose of every species and surely a thing to be celebrated.

But the (over)reaction to seeing babies get fed is not the only indicator of this sad truth about humanity that’s caught my attention.

Nudity in general is deemed somehow shocking and vulgar in modern society, and also has to be kept away from public forums and the children. Unless, again, it’s for sexual gratification, in which case it’s acceptable, or at least something we can turn a blind eye to. People who enjoy being naked as part of their normal, daily lives are made to do so behind closed doors or in designated areas only, and often labelled as weirdos. Because civilisation has decided that wrapping yourself in irritating fibres, suffocating your skin and weakening it to the effects of the sun and environment is a far more normal, healthy and sensible way to live.

Everyone I know who is looking to buy or rent a house wants it to come with the biggest gardens possible, not so they can enjoy the beauty, wonder and power of nature, but so they can endlessly cut, trim, shape, mow, weed and hack things to death in some endlessly futile effort to order and control it.

I often hear children warned against and scolded for running off, getting dirty and climbing trees or any of their artificial counterparts, when in actual fact, as curious little apes, it’s in all of their natural instincts to do so. Apparently we now think it’s better for them to avoid any risk or adventurous discovery whatsoever, and instead sit sedentary, indoors, in front of light projectors, eating processed, additive filled rubbish.

We can’t even resist interfering with the natural properties of other species. We love to share our lives with animals such as dogs and horses, who at their evolutionary peak have developed windproof, waterproof, warm and protective fur to allow them to deal with whatever the elements and environment can throw at them. But humans, in our infinite wisdom, shave all that off so we can replace them with vastly inferior, man-made coats instead.

I for one am wholly unconvinced that any of these examples prove the superior advancement of our species.

But humans are bizarre creatures. We still depend on nature for everything that keeps us alive, yet we are so arrogant as to think we can abuse or be repulsed by it instead of showing gratitude. We treat the natural as the unnatural. We think we’ve risen above the animals, when in so many ways all we’ve done is become the worst example of them. We’re certainly the worst on earth at just being the species that we are. Instead, we have become animals who constantly fight and deny our natural instincts and urges and try our damndest not to behave like animals. We’re conditioned to not want to be what we are, or behave as we’re innately programmed to. We’re often advised to ‘be ourselves’, when in actual fact, that’s the last thing society wants any of us to do. And then we wonder why there have been such dramatic and alarming increases in depression, anxiety and dysfunction related mental illnesses across the globe.

How much will we allow this twisted lifestyle to affect our health, our development, our planet and our future sustainability before we realise it has to change? I’m not saying we should all revert to caveman mode, but the boiled-down fact is we are just an overpopulated bunch of clever primates, and there has to be a line drawn somewhere. Going ‘backwards’ even a little bit would do far more good than harm. I look at humanity and I look at the rest of the animal kingdom, who are all experts at their own individual lifestyles and appreciative of everything nature has given them and resourceful with it, and I genuinely wonder who really are the intelligent ones?