Adulthood Rites
Adulthood Rites shifts the focus from fully human Lilith to her son, Akin. Akin is mostly human, though he has a bit of Oankali mixed in - the first generation in the slow process of the Oankali ultimately subsuming humanity. He's raised in Oankali tradition, which makes him almost more Oankali than human, a distinction that the Oankali don't really understand. And he's the first male child of this new generation, because the Oankali find human men more unpredictable and unstable than the women.
This book got me thinking about the nature vs nurture debate. I believe pretty strongly that nurture has a greater effect on us that nature, and everything I read pushes me further in that direction. Sure, it's our DNA that makes us human rather than chimpanzee. And the two are probably more intricately entwined than we currently understand or that I'm crediting here. Still. Nurture plays a bigger role in our personalities and lives than I think most people credit, because it tends to work in much more subtle ways and be more persistent than most people are willing to admit.
The Oankali believe the opposite. As far as they're concerned, we are our DNA and our destiny is written in our genetic code, never to be altered or overcome. It's why they have such an easy time committing genocide. As far as they're concerned, humanity will die out anyway and hurrying it along won't alter that. It's not them that's killing us; we kill ourselves. They're just letting it happen. And ushering it in perhaps sooner than it needs to be. Second chances mean nothing, because there's no reason to believe that a person or a species will behave differently a second time around.
There are contradictions. Oankali, it seems, are capable of being hypocrites, even if they aren't capable of lying. But then hypocrisy consists of lying to oneself, which is much easier than lying to someone else. They keep humans alive to breed with, not just to make the transition to the next incarnation of their species easier but to preserve our culture. Culture, it seems, is not written in our DNA. What they don't understand is that it's also not something that can just be bound up in a book. Rituals and ceremonies are every bit as important as stories when it comes to defining a human. They are stories acted out.
They recognize this contradiction enough to make room for Akin. Akin is captured by human resisters at a young age and left to live with them for almost two years. As he grows, he is allowed to wander and interact with the human resisters as much as he wants. And when he grows to adulthood, he is allowed to speak for humanity. He's not quite human. He's just Oankali enough to be heard when he finally does speak and says what the humans have been saying for decades. The fact that he is trusted more than an entire species, simply because of the mix of his genetic code, is galling. But it's a breadcrumb. And at this point humans have been starved for so long that they'll gladly accept a bread crumb.
This book got me thinking about the nature vs nurture debate. I believe pretty strongly that nurture has a greater effect on us that nature, and everything I read pushes me further in that direction. Sure, it's our DNA that makes us human rather than chimpanzee. And the two are probably more intricately entwined than we currently understand or that I'm crediting here. Still. Nurture plays a bigger role in our personalities and lives than I think most people credit, because it tends to work in much more subtle ways and be more persistent than most people are willing to admit.
The Oankali believe the opposite. As far as they're concerned, we are our DNA and our destiny is written in our genetic code, never to be altered or overcome. It's why they have such an easy time committing genocide. As far as they're concerned, humanity will die out anyway and hurrying it along won't alter that. It's not them that's killing us; we kill ourselves. They're just letting it happen. And ushering it in perhaps sooner than it needs to be. Second chances mean nothing, because there's no reason to believe that a person or a species will behave differently a second time around.
There are contradictions. Oankali, it seems, are capable of being hypocrites, even if they aren't capable of lying. But then hypocrisy consists of lying to oneself, which is much easier than lying to someone else. They keep humans alive to breed with, not just to make the transition to the next incarnation of their species easier but to preserve our culture. Culture, it seems, is not written in our DNA. What they don't understand is that it's also not something that can just be bound up in a book. Rituals and ceremonies are every bit as important as stories when it comes to defining a human. They are stories acted out.
They recognize this contradiction enough to make room for Akin. Akin is captured by human resisters at a young age and left to live with them for almost two years. As he grows, he is allowed to wander and interact with the human resisters as much as he wants. And when he grows to adulthood, he is allowed to speak for humanity. He's not quite human. He's just Oankali enough to be heard when he finally does speak and says what the humans have been saying for decades. The fact that he is trusted more than an entire species, simply because of the mix of his genetic code, is galling. But it's a breadcrumb. And at this point humans have been starved for so long that they'll gladly accept a bread crumb.
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