Females thrive when fruit flies keep it in the family:
I was feeling in a bitter mood the other day when I was speaking with a dear friend who is very sympathetic with the liberal side of issues. I said that, speaking as a feminist, the world is a dismal place. Europe is a demographic write-off. Over the next generation or two we are simply going to watch them die. Of course maybe I could save them, but it seems unreasonable to hope I’ll have a chance to try, and even if that chance comes neither I nor anybody else knows whether the plan itself would have a chance. And women, in a number of European countries, are treated in a fashion I find acceptable.
Then there is the United States. As developed countries go we look like we will be the last standing. To me it seems inescapable that we must, barring successful intervention by me, go down the same demographic road. But again, nobody knows that. As far as the rest of the world goes I know of no major power in which women are treated as well as I think they need to be treated. In fact over most of the planet, particularly the growing parts, the tale is a nightmare. As a feminist it seems to me that we absolutely cannot lose the United States. That being the case, why would anybody with the slightest interest in women’s welfare tolerate an immigration at all? Every one of the immigrants comes from Somewhere Else, and that is a Bad Thing.
He replied mildly that the immigrants were no random sample of the wide world but were self selected for being those who loved American principles; there was nothing to fear. I thanked him and dropped the issue. I had asked him for his logic and had received it. I had not asked him to persuade me.
Women’s liberation is not exactly a headline movement among fruit flies, but the fact is that sometimes female fruit flies are treated better than at other times. When they are treated badly, they fall infertile and die young. (Scott Pitnick and David W. Pfennig Brotherly Love Benefits Females NATURE vol. 505 no. 7485 January 30, 2014 page 626 and Pau Carazo Within-Group Male Relatedness Reduces Harm to Females in Drosophila page 672 in the same issue) The bottom line is that when three unrelated males and a lone female are put together the males will fight each other viciously and abuse the female, reducing her lifespan. However if three males who are brothers are put with that lone female they will compete less aggressively and they will treat her well so that she lives a longer time.
That should end it. Bottom line: keep it in the family or the females suffer. There should have been a tidal wave of reaction against any policy that encouraged migration either within countries or between countries. Of course there was not a ripple.
Then, political correctness as I suggested not being a fruit fly obsession, the flies demonstrated another behavior. Two males that were brothers and a third not closely related were put with a female (this naturally was repeated a number of times). The outlier competed aggressively with the brothers, abused the female, and – get this – had as much reproductive success as the brothers. Of course this does not necessarily translate directly into human behavior, but I think in all fairness the burden of proof is on anybody who claims otherwise.
But the idea will probably simply vanish without an echo.
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