Steven Pinker -- How the Mind Works - Hampshire High Italian ...

490 J HOW THE MIND WORKSimply that "it's not the man's fault," as it is sometimes claimed. Thosenon sequiturs could be attached to any explanation, such as the commonfeminist theory that men are brainwashed by media images that glorifyviolence against women.All over the world, men also beat and kill cuckolds and suspectedcuckolds. Recall that rivalry over women is the leading cause of violence,homicide, and warfare among foraging peoples. As it is written inProverbs 6:34, "For jealousy is the rage of a man: therefore he will notspare in the day of vengeance."Unlike birds, though, humans plug their sexual jealousy into abaroque cognitive machine. People think in metaphors, and themetaphor that men have always used for wives is property. In their essay"The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Chattel," Wilson and Daly showthat men do not merely aim to control their wives and fend off rivals;they assert an entitlement to wives, especially their reproductive capacity,identical to the right of an owner over inanimate property. An owner cansell, exchange, or dispose of his possessions, can modify them withoutinterference, and can demand redress for theft or damage. These rightsare recognized by the rest of society and can be enforced by collective.reprisals. In culture after culture, men have deployed the full cognitiveapparatus of ownership in conceiving of their relationship to their wives,and until recently they have formalized the metaphor in codes of law.In most societies, marriage is a blatant transfer of ownership of awoman from her father to her husband. In our own marriage ceremony,the father of the bride still "gives her away," but more commonly he sellsher. In seventy percent of societies, someone pays when two people getmarried. In ninety-six percent of these, the groom or his family pays thebride's family, sometimes in cash or a daughter, sometimes in bride-service,whereby the groom works for the bride's father for a fixed period.(In the Bible, Jacob worked for Laban for seven years for the right tomarry his daughter Rachel, but Laban substituted his other daughter,Leah, at the wedding, so Jacob had to work another seven years toacquire Rachel as his second wife.) Dowries, which are more familiarto us, are not a mirror image of bride-wealth, because they go to the newlyweds,not to the bride's parents. The husband notifies other men of hisownership in customs retained by many modern couples. The woman,not the man, wears an engagement ring, bears her spouse's surname, andis given a new form of address, Mrs., short for "mistress of."People can control their property, and husbands (and before them,