Authors Sheehan and Reffell define themselves as "evolutionary behaviorists." If you haven't
heard this term before, it's because Sheehan and Reffell invented it -- with good reason. They've also come up with
a powerful perspective on the complex relationship between males and females. And if you're wondering why BoBuReview
likes this book so much, it's because the gender wars are one of the biggest sources of transnational suffering on the planet,
which "Redefining Seduction" could go a long toward reducing.
What's profoundly
new about their book, "Redefining Seduction, Women Initiating Courtship, Partnership and Peace," is their dredging
up an important part of Charles Darwin's work from "The Descent of Man" that's been suppressed for a long time.
"Does
every male of the same species excite and attract the female equally? Or does she exert a choice, and prefer certain
males? This latter question can be answered in the affirmative by much direct and indirect evidence," Darwin writes
in his "Selection in Relation to Sex."
Interwoven with the charming and frankly-told
story of their unusual 20-year long love affair are Sheehan's and Reffell's insightful observations about the emerging roles
of men and women in post-feminist, post-modern society. It's not enough for women to bewail the dearth of "good
men." Women must step up to the bat and start choosing men for live-affirming rather than life-destroying values.
This,
the authors claim, is the meaning behind Darwin's "Selection in Relation to Sex." Females of all species actually hold the key to evolution because the traits they choose
in their mates are the ones that get passed on to future generations. "Donna's intuitive use of her biological
power to select and seduce the mate of her choice was completely natural . . . Women's ability to guide men into true partnership
is the foundation for forming stable, co-creative cultures in which women and men use their separate, complementary skills
in unison rather than in competition and with unrealistic expectations."
It's time the battle
of the sexes evolved into mutual admiration societies rather than the usual blame games. Men are very good at certain
things, as are women, but in very different domains. Our brains are wired differently, as is becoming common knowledge.
Recognizing our separate strengths and weaknesses would go a long way to creating peace and happiness on the planet,
one pair-bonded couple at a time.
As the saying goes, Evolve or Die. If the human
species doesn't evolve past patriarchy, it's pretty clear what the outcome will be. The values that enabled homo
sapiens to evolve in the past are not the ones that will help us survive in the future. We need new guidelines
and insights, including some perhaps unfamiliar ones -- such as females' role in selecting Beta rather than Alpha males as
mates. (Witness the slew of recent rom-coms where the not-so-A type guy gets the gal.)
From
an interview the authors had with their local paper, the Point Reyes Light: ". . . Charles Darwin's theory
of sexual selection explains that males compete and display for female attention, while females select the males with the
traits most apt for the continuation of the species. Sexual selection and natural selection go hand-in-hand to create
the divergence of traits necessary to survival of a species. Human patriarchal societies have distorted sexual selection
by taking the selection away from women through arranged marriages and the general degradation of women's roles. Women
are biologically designed to select their mates and influence their behavior for the good of the species."
According
to Tibetan Buddhism, any culture that denigrates the wisdom of women is in trouble, materially as well as spiritually. Women's
brilliant wisdom needs to be given equal voice in the affairs of men's brilliant methodology, otherwise we have a lop-sided
system, as in fact is extant today all over the world. Whiz-bang technology without intelligent oversight only creates
more problems, viz, the waste from our nuclear power plants. (I find it hard to believe women would have
dreamed up a power source that couldn't be cleaned up.)
Sheehan and Reffell make a seductive
argument for "seduction as an instrument of positive change in politics, business and romance that men will accept, not
resist." Here's to it!
May 2011
