"One of the more outrageous alternative theories is the idea that males are essentially parasites. Sexual reproduction began when some parasitic organism began injecting its genetic material into an unwitting host in order to utilize its reproductive machinery like a virus. Over the course of evolutionary history, the parasites developed a co-evolutionary symbiosis with their hosts because of the shared genetic material and the benefits of sexual reproduction. Males may look similar to their reproductive hosts, but they are still essentially parasites."

http://www.evolutionary-philosophy.net/sex.html

Ouch

-dR

Interesting, I hope it is not true.

Not a bad theory actually.

but... let's never find out *grin*

-Splicer

That's an interesting perspective. I think it would be more accurate to view males and females as symbiotes, if anything. Sexual reproduction is beneficial to both sexes, after all, especially among those of us who do not have the ability to reproduce without males. (Well, humans technically can I suppose, but it's delicate and expensive and relies on a large population of sexually reproducing working class to maintain an infrastructure that allows it.)