*brandishes cod at evolutionary psychologist*

[tree_and_leaf]

The BBC has a page on answers to the difficult questions children ask, which are mostly science-y (except for 'why did God let my kitten die?' - and couldn't they have asked a theologian as well as the philosopher for that one? - and 'why does my friend have two daddies?').

One of them is 'why do I like pink?' On this, the lay answers are actually more helpful; the philosopher waffles about the Value of the Feminine, but on the other hand 'pink reminds you of other things you like' is reasonable, and an improvement on the psychologist, who produces the usual rubbish about evolutionary psychologists telling us that teh femalez haz evolved to like red, because of the redness of berries (because, of course, there's no such thing as edible blue, black or purple berries in nature!) or, alternatively, because they need to be able to spot when their babies have fevers, and are consequently flushed. Which I would have thought, if colour preference was really genetically hard-wired into us, that women would tend to be filled with a shrinking horror at the sight of pink/ red (why didn't he suggest the rosy cheeks of healthy infants, I wonder?)

Of course, it's all tosh anyway, because a brief examination of historical inventions shows that on the whole, previous centuries in Western Europe (can't speak to other places) associated red/ pink† with men, because it's the colour of blood and therefore Manly, whereas blue was rather feminine. Which is why you generally see Our Lady in blue* (which the more catholically inclined, as Mr Eliot reminds us, tend to consider 'Mary's color').

oursin, may I borrow your codfish?

† Of course there's a separate problem, in that the vocabulary we use to talk about colour is very culturally conditioned anyway, and the middle ages certainly didn't have the sophisticated distinctions between various shades; there isn't, as far as I know, a word in Middle High German for 'pink', for instance, and the colouring of paintings tends to be fugitive. Still, one can tell red from blue.

* Other iconographies of the BVM are available. Ask your art historian, parish priest, or friendly local Anglo-Catholic loon for details. (For instance, you sometimes do see Mary in red; this is to draw attention to the future sufferings of her Son and her participation in it, so it still comes back to bleeding men in the end).

Comments

[tigerfort]

I'm tempted to suspect that the fish-slapping should be aimed at the psychologist quoted, and that no actual evolutionary biologist has said anything of the kind. But it's quite possible that one of the 'evolution explains everything' crowd took one of their excitable wild leaps out of the realm of the plausible, and if they did then they're definitely in line for a fish-slapping too.

[tree_and_leaf]

I seem to vaguely remember this being in the papers a while ago, and I think the scientist involved described himself as an 'evolutionary psychologist.' I've no quarrel with the theory of evolution as applied to biology, but I'm afraid experience leads me to suspect anything describing itself as evolutionary psychology as... codswallop.

[tigerfort]

That seem entirely reasonable, yes :)

[oursin]

U CAN HAZ CODFISH!!
Though for this one I might consider sustainable pollock instead...
I suppose it wasn't actually a little boy asking the question in the first place? (Paging Fotherington-Tomas.)

All a load of pollock?

[tree_and_leaf]

Yes, that's a good question (em_h also asked it, over on LJ). If it was, the poor kid will be left very confused, except at Ros' answer.

[sara]

"Because you've been culturally indoctrinated in a sexist, materialist culture, and I was too weak-willed to help you identify alternative models for identity construction. I'm very sorry."

And "why does so-and-so have two same-sex parents" is only a problem if you've raised your child so ridiculously sheltered that they haven't known any same-sex couples.

(Explaining transgenderism was slightly more complex, but even that was managed in the parking lot of the Bi-Mart -- ironically enough -- one Thursday afternoon, in the space of about two minutes. So many of these things are more difficult for some parents than they ever are for their children.)

[tree_and_leaf]

"Because you've been culturally indoctrinated in a sexist, materialist culture, and I was too weak-willed to help you identify alternative models for identity construction. I'm very sorry."

*snerk* Unless, of course, it was a little boy talking, in which case the questionee has probably done an excellent job.

Actually, I thought the only one of those that actually qualified as a Difficult Question is 'Why is my kitty dead?' (I mean, the problem of pain is a theological locus classicus for a reason). Admittedly I wasn't aware of homosexuality growing up, but I don't remember finding it difficult to get my head around.

[sara]

Well, I will say this for being in the cemetery business, your kids have to come to terms with mortality real early -- because half the people we know, we know through the cemetery, and a lot of them we know because they lost kids early. So there's no way my kids have anything like a sense of immortality. Which worries me, sometimes, but also I think that was normal for children until very recently, so I don't worry about it too much.

(Of course, my answer to the problem of pain and death has always been, "I have no idea. That's why he's the Almighty and I'm not. I can only assume there's some instructional purpose. Or else the Gnostics were right.")