Is This The End Of Men As We Know It?

The differences between men and women are getting smaller. So what does the future hold for us?

- Joe Mackertich

Depending on how you look at it, the women of the Sanumá tribe in Venezuela are either really fortunate or particularly unlucky. The female members of the hunter-gatherer rainforest community have – for as long as anyone’s ever known – called the shots. In Sanumán society it’s the ladies who organise functions. It’s the women who arrange marriages. It’s even the women who labour in the fields, distribute crops and carry tools back and forth through the jungle.

Why are they unlucky?

Because their male counterparts haven’t kept up their end of the bargain. While the ladies are running things, the men have relinquished all responsibilities apart from those relating to mystical rituals. And it just so happens that Sanumán mystic rituals revolve around the hammering of naturally occurring psychotropic drugs like DMT. Picture it: the women – broad-shouldered, capable, full of beans; the men – withered, giggling, stoned and useless, like your wasteman nephew after a weekend spent with nothing for company but FIFA and Pringles.

The Sanumá situation is extreme, but it could provide a microcosmic illustration of the way things are heading. Physically, men have been on a downward spiral for some time. Our aboriginal ancestors, judging by their skeletons and footprints, would have been able to run as fast as Usain Bolt. Rowers in Ancient Greece could perform feats that can’t be duplicated by modern athletes. The arm bones of elite tennis players are