LIFE: Infidelity and Talkativeness -- 2 Cavemen Theories

December 11, 2008: our department had a Holiday Dinner party. As we were leaving for it, the breaking news was that Bernard Madoff was arrested for operating the largest Ponzi scheme in history. We had drinks before the dinner party and the chatter got to Madoff and cheating. It was easy to understand why Madoff cheated ... greed... pure and simple.

Then one of my co-workers started talking about infidelity. One of his former co-workers cheated on his wife. The talk went back and off amongst us and we all were married and said we would not cheat on our wives. Some of them wondered why men cheat. Most of them knew a cheater... they have money, they hadvea loving wife, they have children. Why do men cheat on their wives?

I mentioned that I heard some theory about infidelity and it was hardwired to our genetic makeup to ensure the survival of the human race. Cavemen would mate with whichever cavewomen they could. I also stated that I had no backup to this, that is, I didn't have books/authors/sites etc to back up what I heard. One of my co-workers mentioned that he has heard that, but if he ever cheated on his wife (he wouldn't), but if he ever did cheat, he could not use the "caveman/survival of the race" defense. He has already used 'cavemen' as a defense for something else. I was curious as to what he was talking about. I was puzzled.

My coworker says that back in the cavemen days, it was a hunter-gatherer society. I nodded in agreement. He says that men were the hunters and the women were gatherers of fruits, nuts, etc. So far, so good, I understood this. I was curious where he was going with this.

He described a typical hunting foray... men go out with their weapons... they lay in hiding when they see an animal... they had to be quiet or else they scare off their prey. An image of Elmer Fudd in Fred Flintstone's outfit holding a spear and whispering, "Shhhh! I'm hunting mastodons." came to mind. LOL

My co-worker then goes on to describe how women went out to gather food. They would all go out and make as much noise as they can... talking to each other loud enough for the wild animals to hear and be scared off. That made sense. That was their survival mechanism.

And then he laid it on me... the punchline... mental drumroll please.....

He doesn't talk much to his wife just to talk or to pass time, and his wife blabbers on and on constantly whenever. He says generally men are taciturn and women are verbose. Everytime his wife is in the mood to talk, he doesn't converse back. She gets upset and asks why he doesn't talk to her. He says, "Blame it on the cavemen!". And then he says, "If I ever cheated on my wife, I couldn't use your 'cavemen defense' as I use it already for not talking to her."

We both broke out into a good long laughter!