why is female curiosity so often portrayed as the origin of sin in folklore? Their own sin as an individual, sure, I can understand that might be something you wanted to teach your daughters, but why should curiosity cause all sin generally?
The feminist answer: because in a social system set up to favour men, it's much more dangerous to let girls grow up to question things and wonder "why?" than it is if boys do the same thing.
More generally: if you're living in a dangerous, subsistence-level economy without much scientific knowledge of the world or advanced medical resources, curiosity can get you killed. Worse, it could get your entire community killed. "What does this taste like?" "What happens if we plant these seeds instead of the ones we normally use?" "Will this branch hold my weight?" "I wonder if those strangers would be friendly if I went to talk to them?" "Is that snake poisonous?" "Will the gods really punish us if we stop sacrificing to them?" "Will brandishing a Star of David at a vampire scare it off, or just get me eaten?" . Because we've seen so many scientific advances in the last 300 years, we tend to forget the stability of the previous 300,000. Our ancestors surely weren't stupid, so small-'c' conservatism must have had survival value for them.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2007-07-19 11:14 pm (UTC)The feminist answer: because in a social system set up to favour men, it's much more dangerous to let girls grow up to question things and wonder "why?" than it is if boys do the same thing.
More generally: if you're living in a dangerous, subsistence-level economy without much scientific knowledge of the world or advanced medical resources, curiosity can get you killed. Worse, it could get your entire community killed. "What does this taste like?" "What happens if we plant these seeds instead of the ones we normally use?" "Will this branch hold my weight?" "I wonder if those strangers would be friendly if I went to talk to them?" "Is that snake poisonous?" "Will the gods really punish us if we stop sacrificing to them?" "Will brandishing a Star of David at a vampire scare it off, or just get me eaten?" . Because we've seen so many scientific advances in the last 300 years, we tend to forget the stability of the previous 300,000. Our ancestors surely weren't stupid, so small-'c' conservatism must have had survival value for them.