Education, manners, etiquettes hone the society, from an aboriginal and primitive origin to modern day’s society.
But a sincere and truthful look at today’s society and one wonders, has the society changed so much? Have the ways of life changed so greatly?
The answer might differ from person to person depending on their depth of understanding, eye for minor details, capability to visualize in a holistic perspective, vested interest in calling their society developed, civilised and modern, et al.
I for one, would not say that all things have remained constant ever since man began to live and roam in groups. But, definitely some things never change, or rather the law makers themselves being mere mortals and having full knowledge of their human weaknesses of flesh and blood, make loop-sided laws to facilitate the fulfilment of human desires.
Knowingly we try to change but unknowingly we don’t. A close examination of ways of modern day’s society and an aboriginal society definitely points out some things don’t change.
DATING – This was one of the basic characteristics of the tribal culture. You could choose a woman of your choice and take her with you for hunting and if she made a good partner you choose to live with her. Obviously there were no terminologies used for such asking a woman to accompany a man for hunting and the later living together was not termed as married but how does it matter? The bonding between a man and a woman was equally strong.
The point of discussion here is there were no customs like arranged marriage and a man choose the woman who turned out to be his perfect hunting partner.
The ways of today’s modern society doesn’t seem much different. The custom of arranged marriages is slowly giving way to young couples dating with each other to find there suitable match and on finding their match they get married.
AFTER MARITAL AFFAIRS – In primitive societies there was no security to an individual’s life. People got killed during hunting, forest fires, by wild animals, diseases etc. This was the reason way a man or a woman had relationship with more than one better half. A man might go to hunt of find food leaving his wife in the safe custody of another man and they spent time together as man and woman for as long as he didn’t return from hunting which might be a day or a week or more, or worse didn’t return at all.
Present day’s reasons may differ greatly but whatever the reason a man having physical or emotional relationship with more than one woman and vice versa has become a common thing and the trend is only growing.
NUCLEAR FAMILIES – There was no concept like joint family among the primitive culture. The role of a man and a woman was to produce off spring, take care of them till they could take care of their own needs and let them move on. The main role of the couple was to keep producing off-springs for as long as their hormones and genitals allowed them. True, they were forced to do so for numerous factors like high mortality rates, need for more hands to collect more food for the group, et al. Besides lack of other sources of entertainment and even if they did indulge in rock paintings and carvings on stones and trees but fact remains could those sources of entertainment beat a good fuck?
Coming back to today’s modern society, off-springs moving out of their parental house either to study, make a career or for so many other reasons, we are seeing a rising rate of nuclear families. Accepted that the parent couple does not only engage in producing off springs but this does not change the fact that we are experiencing a move from joint families to nuclear families.
FIGHT FOR FEMALE – For aeons man has been fighting for woman. A beautiful woman has been the desire of every man with a healthy mind and an appropriate hormonal system. History has documented great wars like Troy, the fight between Rama and Ravana, et al.
Compare it to present day fights between boys who want the same girl as their girl friend. It’s a tough fight. It’s a fight which involves mind games, strategy and at times brutal masculine physical fight.
Beautiful and sexy girls have always been the cause for many a fight. No girls are not to be blamed because it’s the fault of the male dominated society. After years and years of fighting for women, the modern day’s civic society has not yet learned that a balance between male to female ratio is what is essential for a healthy society.
CONFLICT RESOLUTION – Eye for eye, tooth for tooth. This is how conflict was resolved in primitive societies. It was a part of their existence, and a vital part without which they would have perished. If sum one attacked them, they retaliated with full force. One may argue there were no court of law and no written legislature. Again life then was hard and full of hardships.
There were a lot many things to take care of ranging from finding food, fending off other tribes, et al. So where was the time to waste in undergoing lengthy legislative procedures had there been such institutions like court of law?
One does not find much difference in today’s modern society. Whether its inter group conflicts among small school going kids, fellow students fighting for several reasons in college, shoot out incidences in universities, inter gang clashes, actions of individuals or gangs for revenge, all of them just by pass the established legal processes. No, we are not arguing about the credibility of the legal system. But we are just trying to say even in today’s civilized and modern society, conflict resolution still remains as it was in primitive society. Here certainly one don’t find a cent per cent match, as the degree to which individuals take it upon them to take their revenge has decreased and there are a lot many people who now take the civilized method of punishing avengers by following the established legal norms.
FIGHT FOR TERRITORY – In ancient world, the various civilizations had to expand their boundaries to acquire more cultivation land, gather more man power and domestic-able animals, supplies for armies and gain more power and influence, et al. We called them primitive and barbarian.
So are the modern civilizations any different? Most of the modern and developed countries as we call them were and are at the forefront of barbarian aggression and colonialism. So are they really very different from the primitive civilizations and barbarian tribes?
In today’s world we often hear about nuclear deterrent and an exploding arms race under various contexts. We have also seen the bi-polarization of the world to act as a deterrent against war. But have the so called deterrents been successful? I feel not. It’s all the same. Modern civilizations do show the same aggression and intrusion into others territory and they have plenty of excuses to put forth for such displays of territorial aggression.
FOOD HABITS – Primitive societies consumed flesh burned on fire and we call them uncivilized because they didn’t know the use of oil, ghee, butter and spices. They consumed fruits and roots. Finally they stated farming and used animal excreta as manure.
So is the modern society any different? We crave for the yummy kebabs and tandoor food, a form of meat burnt on fire. All our prestigious find of spices, oil, butter, ghee have given rise to innumerable diseases among humans. So we are advised by our intellectual dieticians to do eat fruits and roots and to avoid our proud finds like spices, oil, butter, etc.
And what should one say about all the industrial inventions of fertilizers and manures. Yes they are good as they increase the productivity of land. But instead these chemicals detoriate the nutritional content of our food. The dieticians of the modern and civilized society advice - consume organic food. The health conscious and the wealthy have already started to consume organic food, and the rest of the society will catch up soon enough. Organic farms have already started sprouting across vast stretches of land. And soon enough we might witness a revolution…. a revolution of modern day farming giving way to organic farming or in other words primitive way of cultivation.
Of course, all this discussion does not mean to say, there has been no progress. Civilizations have made important invention, taken pride for it and used it against one another for selfish gains. But, the silver lining in this black cloud has been, the realization of such folly sooner or later and using those inventions to make life better for the general man.
