Promiscuity

Many people associate promiscuity with the onset of modern, "Western" culture and the decline of traditional morals. The shocking truth though is that cultures which many may regard as primitive can be far more promiscuous.

In the Dyak communities in Sarawak, everyone stays together in the longhouse, which can contain many families. Now if a girl sleeps with some young fellow it is really no big deal, since everyone stays together as one big family anyway, the babies are just cared for by the old women who really don't have much else to do anyway. So everything is fine and dandy.

According to what I have heard, if outside visitors go and visit the longhouses, after the proper ceremonies have been performed and the chief satisfied they become formal visitors of the longhouse and are treated warmly. During this warmth and cheer some hanky panky may occur. As each family within the longhouse has its own room, it might seem hard to accomplish such behavior. Yet the defense of family members is not foolproof; the room is not sealed tight as there is an airspace between the wall and the ceilings. Ardent young men can then climb over the wall and achieve consummation with the young unmarried daughters, if they do not resist the other members of the family treat it as a normal occurrence.

Of course if you decide to try this experience after reading my blog I would refrain from taking any responsibility for your wellbeing, as there may well still be headhunters in the region.

Even this liberality pales before that of the traditional Tibetan society though.

In Tibet, out on the plains, the old custom is that once girls reach a marriageable age of 15 or so, they move out from the main tent in which the family resides into a smaller white tent some yards away. This is an open invitation for every young man in the vicinity to come and make love to her. Once she is pregnant, she is prime marriageable material for she has proven her fertility, thus marriage invitations come flying in like spam mail. Due to the poor hygiene and healthcare in the area, getting pregnant is not easy at all!

The result of this is nobody knows who their father is, at least for firstborn kids. Lest you imagine many Darth Vader moments, the fathers don't know who their kid is too. I think the most that could be done is a rough guess.

Therefore we can see that promiscuity is not copyrighted by modern society at all. Not by far.