The Cracked Podcast #166

When you think about ancient human history, you probably think about sex, right? Who doesn’t? And when you do, you probably imagine in your head (because you love envisioning your eldest relatives gettin’ down) a very bland, puritanical form of sex where they do it through a sheet once every other year and only to conceive, right? Well, sorry to make you throw up in your mouth a little bit, but your ideas of chastened ancestors living repressed lives are as wrong as the next images we’re about to put in your mind: ancient humans were nasty little horndogs. In fact, the basically standard modern ideas of monogamy and fidelity are extremely recent developments in human history. They’ve only been around for about 10,000 years — a blink of the evolutionary eye.

So what was the ancient hunter-gatherer love like actually like? And what can we learn about our own sex lives from looking at how the cavemen got down? A lot, actually. So we asked an expert. By studying prehistoric human cultures and the sex lives of our two closest genetic relatives, chimps and bonobos, Dr. Christopher Ryan has some pretty eye-opening stuff to share about human sexuality. So Jack O’Brien welcomes Dr. Ryan on this bonus episode of The Cracked Podcast to talk with Teresa Lee and Michael Swaim about swinging tribes-people, primitive vibrators and ape balls in a conversation that is bound to make you rethink everything you know about love and sexuality.

Footnotes:

Book: Christopher Ryan & Cacilda Jetha: Sex At Dawn: https://goo.gl/NkZVye

Podcast: Christopher Ryan: Tangentially Speaking: https://goo.gl/uWl7mK

Scholarly Article: Michael Gurven & Hilliard Kaplan: Longevity Among Hunter-Gatherers: https://goo.gl/9LXdBo

Article: Jared Diamond: The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race: https://goo.gl/4k9zM

Article: Cracked: 5 Gender Stereotypes That Used To Be The Exact Opposite: https://goo.gl/zgnNG

Article: Cracked: 6 Horrifying Facts That Get Left Out Of History: https://goo.gl/ItWwcK

Article: Cracked: 7 X-Rated Traditions That Prove History Was Horny As F*$&: https://goo.gl/9XxknD

Article: Cracked: The 6 Most Cynical Exploitations of Romantic Love in History: https://goo.gl/Hik16

Article: Cracked: 6 Factors That Secretly Influence Who You Have Sex With: https://goo.gl/oIAFD

Article: Cracked: 5 Insignificant Things That Determine Who You Have Sex With: https://goo.gl/0i8cQ