Essays in Idleness

Scott Symons observed, one-third of a century ago, that, “There is no blood left to be shed in the Battle of the Sexes in Ontario.” In the time since, it has continued bloodlessly. I am reminded that this apocalypse is also being conducted around the globe, and is at its worst in the more exotic places, such as California.

Finally, even Persia is rejoining the battle, it having been paused when Shah Pahlavi slipt on the banana peel of history. But now the ladies are lighting cigarettes on the burning mullah posters. They had apparently tired not only of Islam (Persia never having been a Muslim country), but of having their worldviews condensed to the interior of a potato sack, and then painted black.

However, the glib reign of statistics continues, with a constant supply of numbers both inside and outside the Dar al-harb. It has been two centuries, or perhaps three, since men in either hemisphere ceased to know what was happening around them, owing to our collective absorption by revolutionary numbers. Numbers have since been enough for us.

The latest two surprising, but essentially meaningless statistics, help to mystify conditions on the ground in that Battle of the Sexes. I obtained these numbers by accident, while trying to follow an Internet discussion. According to the first, by the age of thirty, more than fifty percent of males are virgins. That is an increase of five times from when I was young.

Also, I learnt, approximately seventy percent of women are now copulating with twenty percent of the remaining men, or at least, were while the survey was being conducted. This, I would guess, is the exact reverse of what pertained during my junior years.

Each sex would seem to be progressing towards what now must come into view, with the men already half-way there. Since they remain the physically stronger sex, we may expect them to keep their virtue.