The Human Sexes
Will boys always be boys and girls always be girls? Will we ever really understand each other? You may be shocked by your conclusions.
Prepare yourself for an intimate, erotic examination of physical differences between the sexes, from body fat to brain power.
See Turkish men demonstrate their suitability as mates by wrestling in olive oil. Celebrate Mardi Gras in New Orleans, where women bare their breasts to entice men to reward them with strings of beads.
1. Different But Equal. Observe women who flaunt their femininity as exotic dancers, and female body builders who develop their muscles to the point of masculinity. Examine brain scans that show that men and women even think differently about the same problems. Different But Equal explores whether the amazing differences between men and women are based on biology or history.
2. The Language Of The Sexes. How does boy meet girl? Is finding a mate ever easy? How do you send out a signal that you're available? There are as many ways to speak the Language Of The Sexes as there are cultures. The Japanese build shrines to the male phallus. many Muslim women live behind veils. Ethiopian tribeswomen enlarge their lips with ceramic plates, and some Chinese used to crush women's feet to keep them tiny and delicate. Compare all this to America, where women practice gender amplification with silicone breast implants, collagen lip injections and tight high heels. It's easy to see why the Language Of The Sexes is so hard to understand.
3. Patterns Of Love. How far would you go for love? Get ready to be amazed as you see people go further than you ever thought possible. Patterns Of Love will take you to a brothel in Nevada, love hotels for married adults in Japan and a bachelor auction in Alaska. You'll meet pop star Mongo Faya of Cameroon... and his 58 wives. Visit Istanbul's Topkapi Palace where the Sultans keep harems of hundreds of wives. Fly to Moscow with a group of American men hoping to bring home just one wife. And check out technology's answer to a troubled marriage: an automatic divorce machine that accepts all major credit cards. Patterns Of Love may change your definition of love.
4. Passages Of Life. Morris catalogues the ways human cultures mark, honor, and celebrate the biological transition from childhood to puberty, and how such rituals distinguish men from women. Highlights include a theory that circumcision originated in ancient Egypt as part of a snake religion strategy for achieving immortality.
5. The Maternal Dilemma. In today's world' is it tougher to be a mother... or a father? Will it ever be possible to balance work and motherhood? No matter what you currently believe, The Maternal Dilemma will surprise you with new insight. See working mothers in Japan and England who leave their children in day-care centers. Discover the 'granny solution' in Greece. Explore the 'paternal solution' with stay-at-home fathers in America. Have dinner with a man from Utah who has several wives: some have children while others pursue careers. Compare women who work in fields with babies at their side, to Western women trying to balance kids with a career. It'll soon become clear that The Maternal Dilemma is something everybody shares.
6. The Gender Wars. Do you know what side of the Battle Of The Sexes you're on? You might be stunned by this eye-opening look at the recent struggle for equality between the sexes. Originally, there was a primitive balance between the sexes, but when people left the village for the city, the natural balance disappeared. Find out the origins of honeymoons and other tools of male dominance like wedding rings and female circumcision. Travel to Finland for the annual wife-carrying contest celebrating the capture of women from other villages. follow the rise of feminism, from turn-of-the-century suffragettes to the National Organization for Women. Visit the front lines of the gender wars with female stock traders and female firefighters who parachute into blazing California forests. Pay attention: what you learn here may just help you survive The Gender Wars.
Achem's and Frasdebois, I was about to comment on the religion nonsense but your comment is equally deserving of my recommendation. Aesop offers better fables and can't really piss anyone off. The documentary is good, but his footage of the cave painting might confuse some in America since they were painted 11,000 years ago and their fable tells them Adam wasn't made from mud, earth. and a breath for another 5,000 years. btw, another book of stories by Rudyard Kipling called Just So stories are great too.
It is very difficult for me to accept the fact that many of these comments emphasizing the divide between males and females, and the subsequent stratification of males over females, were posted within the last decade. The main reason why it is so difficult for me to accept this is because I have come to accept the differences between the biological and mental male and female through learning of our capabilities and shortcomings.
This "gender war" is a classic example of the centricity on both sides, their idealizations of these roles and statuses and the operation of the fundamental attribution error.
Humans can be dominated by the situation without one's awareness of the situational forces in the social context.
My view is achieved by blending major and minor schools of thought regarding how and why humans interact to bring a more applicable framework to the interactions of humans on many scales, even though I realize there are many exceptions in many situations. And this fact always keeps me in my place as a smaller part of a larger whole with dynamic systems of relation.
Man... we are so misguided...
In "The Maternal Dilemma" (And I admit I didn't watch the others. My stomach rebelled at so much condescending attitude towards women.)
The very careful phrasing that implies it is a woman's job to care for the children, all those "natural" thrown around... the ambitious women that chose career over caring for their children, the breastfeeding comment, ... And they chose a woman in a burka as a woman leading a 'wonderfully satisfying existence'? In Yemen? In 1983?
Was anyone bothered by how sexist this is?
Also, the author of this was a sociobiologist. Basically it tries to explain society through biology. Sociobiology is a bit... well, among sociologists it's criticized to be overly simplistic, deterministic, and personally I find it paints a very insulting picture of humanity (humans proving to being able to overcome their animal instincts, to form society and civilization, and all).
Man is so stupid its a wonder we have got this far. Spending money on wars, religions, worship money,smoking, drugs, hate, fighting etc and nothing will change for the next 100 thousand years if we last that long.
The basis of civilization is gender roles and its perfect dynamics.
Destroying gender roles is destroying civilization.
men will be men,women will be women.
no matter what it may be perceived,Almighty created MEN for work,WOMEN for housekeeping.Although Women have started to take control of woking for bread.The maternal instinct suppresses everything....They see men as there guardian....Her Children are their treasures....Gifted to her by husband..
Desmond Morris (eugenicist) actually said that there were 600,000,000 of us on the planet. Rather a leap to the oft quoted 6BN .....
It opens with a stupid woman applying full makeup to her reluctant toddler - is this supposed to typify parental behaviour? Bitch should have stuck to barbie dolls.
Sorry JB but It's easy to tell you are 21.
If you would double check who desmond moris was, you might have realized that you spouting nonsense. He is a legend in zoology and anthropology. Calling desmond moris weak anthropologist, is like calling Einstein a science enthusiast. It reaffirm gender roles , because they are based on biology and culture play only some role. Men are programed to like curves, and women know it.
Age of documentary plays no part in its accuracy. It is actually more accurate than politically correct world we living in now. It would be much harder to see this kind of documentary made in this day and age. Your comments is a perfect example of why.
As for who i am? I am a well know Dating Coach in US and seeing someone like 21 year old "know it all" critic work of Dr. Desmond Moris is laughable.Oh i am sorry , you probably 22 now. And for those who agree with JB, just shows how little you know.
Here is a list of Work by Desmon Moris, i hope you can bring same amount of knowledge as Mr. Moris when you come back to argue.
* The Biology of Art (1963) - a look at the paintings of primates and their relation to human art
* The Mammals: A Guide to the Living Species (1965) — a comprehensive and compelling listing of all mammal genera, all non-rodent non-bat species, and additional information on select species.
* The Naked Ape (1967) — an unabashed look at the human species. The book is notable for its focus on humanity's animalistic qualities and our similarity with other apes. Reprinted many times and in many languages, it continues to be a best-seller.
* The Human Zoo (1969) — a continuation of the previous book, analysing human behaviour in big modern societies and their resemblance to animal behaviour in captivity.
* Intimate Behaviour (1971) — this book examines and analyses any physical contact acted out by human animals. From clapping, to having a hair cut, to hand jive, to patting on the back, to hugging, to babe suckling, to copulation...
* . (1978. First published 1977), Manwatching: A Field Guide to Human Behaviour, St Albans, Hertsfordshire, UK: Triad/Panther Books, ISBN 0-586-04887-1 Reprinted 2002 by Vintage as Peoplewatching. ISBN 9780099429784
* Gestures: Their Origin and Distribution (1979)
* Animal Days (1979) — Autobiographical
* The Soccer Tribe (1981)
* Pocket Guide to Manwatching (1982)
* Inrock (1983)
* Bodywatching – A Field Guide to the Human Species (1985) — Hundreds of photos analyzing the human body from hair down to the feet.
* Catwatching: & Cat Lore (1986) — a study of one of the most popular of household pets across the centuries.
* Dogwatching (1986) — an in-depth study of "man's best friend".
* Horsewatching (1989) — subtitled "Why does a horse whinny and everything else you ever wanted to know"
* Animalwatching (1990)
* Babywatching (1991)
* The Human Animal (1994) — book and BBC documentary TV series
* The Human Sexes (1997) — Discovery/BBC documentary TV series
* Cat World: A Feline Encyclopedia (1997)
* The Naked Eye (2001)
* Dogs: The Ultimate Dictionary of over 1000 Dog Breeds (2001)
* Peoplewatching: The Desmond Morris Guide to Body Language (2002)
* The Naked Woman: A Study of the Female Body (2004)
* Linguaggio muto (Dumb language) (2004)
* The Nature of Happiness (2004)
* Watching (2006)
* The Naked Man: A Study of the Male Body (2008)
* Baby: A Portrait of the First Two Years of Life (2008)
* Planet Ape (2009)
In the part "Gender Wars" its disgusting how they carefully avoid talking about how perfectly East European socialist countries achieved equality many many decades ago. How typical of the English to so much readily look to the far East first than ever to the almost next door neighbors.
Only the first part is working. I'd love to see the rest.
I will not go as far as to accuse that the documentary is illogical or that the narrator is a liar. However, I contend that these documentaries are mostly reiterating gender differences and supporting them using ideologically-laden pseudo-science rather that trying to explain gender differences.
As with all documentaries, we as the audience will probably have to think twice about accepting the "fact" that these documentaries presents or we risk getting ourselves brain-washed into accepting the set of ideology presented to us.
First, it blurs the sex-gender distinction. Although sex and gender are mutually reinforcing, they are entirely different concepts. Sex is biological, in the sense that one is born a male, female, hermaphrodite or otherwise. Gender is a culturally-dependent interpretation of sex (whether one is seen by his/her culture as masculine or feminine or androgenous. Note: It is dependent on culture!)One adopts a gender identity and performs gender roles in accordance to how his/her society defines it to be. This documentary, the first episode in particular, is rather ethnocentric, in the sense that it ignores cultural variations in gender roles. It also tries to explain sex (and gender differences) from a white, middle-class, urbanista perspective.
The first depisode tries to explain gender differences in biological terms, which is a rather back-dated explanation coming from a sociological point of view. It reaffirms gender roles in accordance to the white, middle class, patriarchal society perspective. For example, it tries to explain reiterate that males are born to be muscular and this is why men engage in sports. The inverted statement that "men engage in sports and this is why they are more muscular" seems to make more sense to me. Furthermore, the documentary seems to get our attention on the points that it tries to prove. E.g. on the part explaining masculinity in clip 1, a muscular man with long hair is playing by the beach (near 6:00, is long hair macho?), and a few seconds later we see some men wearing coloured loincloths running in a line (near 7:50, read: coloured, pink, red,..., flamboyant and not exactly macho). So please avoid over trusting such "evidence" and feel free to challenge what the documentary presents you with! :)
The "bicycle/bike" argument in previous posts is rather interesting as well. The point put forward by the documentary is that men are genetically-predisposed to have higher spatial-logical awareness as compared to women. The documentary attempts to trace it back to the hunter-gatherer societies where men are assumed to be hunters and women are assumed to be care-givers and gatherers. This is built on weak anthropological evidence. More recent findings (for the past three decades I dare say) has it that women in such societies perform almost the same tasks as men, and they devote less time to childcare. The documentary's biologically-based explanations seem to assume that women are pregnant, child-rearing or menstruating 24 hours a day, 365 days a year for their entire lives. Besides, in ancient Southeast Asian societies, women are known to be traders, warriors and sea-farers. As such, the documentary's exaggeration on gender role specialisation is largely ethnocentric and it only reiterates gender biasness of the "public male-domestic female" of many present society.
There are some parts of this set of documentaries that are less ethnocentric and more factual. However, some parts are clearly doubtful if you stop and think about it. As such, I challenge YOU viewers to think about what you watch and listen through documentaries and not wholly accept it as an unbiased, factual, and non-political piece of work. Cheers!
(I am a 21 year old male. Any comments or criticisms are welcome)
These series of documentary need one more, related to very current time.
excellent ,very informative work
Could be please all agree to say BIKE – who the hell uses the word bicycle anyway
This is a trully good series of documentaries. thanks Desmond morris.
This is a trully good series of documentaries. thanks Desmond morris.
@The unknown one
You are forgetting that Women are just as much a fool as any Man. Women can create and destroy as any man.
Men aren't the only ones who create war and pollution, both genders are very capable of destruction and so forth, I'm starting to think you are sexist to the Male gender.
We are supposed to be working together not fighting one another to prosper in life. You probably fear males from what I'm feeling from the post you made.
The idea of equality is vague nonsense. How would one construct a scientific test to determine whether one human is perfectly equal to another? The idea is pure rhetoric. It may be poetic. And it may have application in law. In other words, "under the law all people ought to be considered equal." But I doubt even identical twins are equal in every respect. Can you imagine Congress enacting a law requiring all football teams to hire as many female players as male? Can you imagine doing away with the "draft" in which teams get options to choose a particular player, because all men are "equal" to one another, and which are also equal to all women? LOL! Yeah, right.
excellent ,very informative work.
Different But Equal
its more of a theory rather than actual fact.its more of an idea or thought
Hi all
You seem to have all forgotten the real point of the documentary. We are the beings that nature created us to be; to forget this is to be delusional.
Womanhood is magnificent; not because it is capable of mimicing men but because it has a sacred worth of its own. Men may create or destroy but that is of no consequence to a natural woman.
Her great magnificence is in her maternity. Everything is pointless without her contribution. What men achieve is nonsense in the real scheme of things. Great mothering is the greatest gift to humanity; there lies all peace, all justice and all cooperation.
Why do we only value what men achieve when all it leads to is war and pollution? Men are fools and all who mimic them are fools. It is only those who value the suffering in creating life that are determined to protect it.
This documentary is not old fashioned it is just inconvenient in a world that know longer knows right from left.
Happiness can only be found in being your natural self. There is no way of hiding from this truth.
Best wishes to all
to waqas,
in islam u can marry 4 women but u can "buy" endless number of enslaved women "odalisques"...
it is legal that a Muslim can have sex with unlimited number of women if he had money of course, so praise "Allah" for this.
An ex-muslim
by the way,.,dont bother wasting your time correcting spelling and grammar mistakes.i know i made some so dont need teaching.
well well well ,.,lol.the old relgion dispute. im not going to get into a big grammar/spell check/idiology and philosophical debate. however, i am christian, so to speak. that beng said, there are just as much horrid histories within the christian debacle. i wont go into it to much, but im pretty sure as far as persecution goes, christians are vile themselves. i was brought up roman catholic, in ireland no less, and its an absolute disgrace. i have also read numerous accounts of sexual abuse within all protestant,methodist, presbyterian and other christian faiths. then there is jehovas witnesses, they have beliefs about not allowing certain medical care to there members, i.e blood transfusion and the likes. then there are our lovely jewish counter parts, spieling from a similiar book and belif system to that of islam and christianity. they are however involved in a distasteful persecution of innocent muslim and christian people in palestine. look that up guys, an intersting truth about religious bullying. and before you start with the whole,oh the palestinians are terrorists and suicide bombers, lets look at what options their left with. f all..oh and my lovely evangelical friends in the states, what a beautiful crowd of fk wits you are, nice man that ted haggard is, demonising homosexuals, while all along he was a meth head gay man himself, not even a decent gay man, but someone who hired male prostitutes and then went home to sleep with his wife. he was christian. now as for the islamic baddies, there are plenty and no islamic man or woman can deny that. there have been beheadings and there have been legitimate reasons for people to turn against you, so deal with the reason you have been shown in a bad light, the reasons sit on your side of the fence. i am in no way statin alegiance to any faith because according to all your faiths im either going to hell or no inherting the kingdom of god because i am gay myself. well to be fair, if all you bigoted christian, muslim, jewish bible/qu'ran/(jewish equivalent),BASHERS are going to heaven.,then i would gladly go to hell with all the innocent homosexuals..
anyway end of my rant,,i didnt even bother my ars e to watch this doc, not even intersted n it,.but this conversation annoyed me,.,i might go and start a few rants on some religious ones now lol,.,
peace to all
ps,dopnt be so absurd as to treat somone as less as an intelect because they cannot speak or write correctly in there second language. before you judge, try learn a language guys.......oh and also just as an endnote, some of the most illiterate and un articulate english speakers i have ever come accross,.,are in england,.,so is is something not worth boasting about..