Female only societies in girls' comics

[Marionette]

Of course any society made up only of women that have not had access to any kind of immortality potion has its own built-in obsolescence.

Not so. They generally come up with some form of parthenogenisis fairly quickly. Either technologically or via nature. Which isn't even completely far-fetched.

Here's a link to a clip from a BBC Nature documentary about lesbian lizards. They manage fine without any males at all. http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/adaptations ... s#p006v48r

[comixminx]

Of course any society made up only of women that have not had access to any kind of immortality potion has its own built-in obsolescence.

Not with SCIENCE. There were plenty of films of the the 'man trap' type society where the women were painted as man-hungry vixens, but in SF depictions of that sort of thing they got over the physical difficulties with artificial wombs, parthenogenesis, and the like.

[Phoenix]

Not so. They generally come up with some form of parthenogenisis fairly quickly. Either technologically or via nature. Which isn't even completely far-fetched. Here's a link to a clip from a BBC Nature documentary about lesbian lizards. They manage fine without any males at all. http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/adaptations ... s#p006v48r

Fine, Mari, I've watched the clips. Thank you for the link. To be fair, I have known about these virgin births in the animal kingdom for a good few years, but the human female is surely far more complicated, biologically speaking, than lizards and aphids. I can only imagine it happening in the real world at some time in the far distant future, and only then if there is no possibility whatsoever of copulation with a male. I'm not a scientist but if there is any future threat of a worldwide mass extinction of men I very much doubt whether parthenogenesis will kick in quickly enough to save any of the remaining females. Homo sapiens will depart the planet just as surely as our cavemen ancestors did, and that's assuming that global warming doesn't do for the lot of us first.

[Tammyfan]

In the Golden Age of Wonder Woman there were young Amazon girls, whose origin was never explained. Diana herself was the only child on the island with an origin, and she grew up together with Mala. The girls disappeared in later years and it was an all-adult women society. In the post-Crisis era, Paradise Island also started as a childless society except for Diana herself. However, as of late some writers have returned to the mythological idea of the Amazons procreating with men, but raising only the female babies and disposing of the males (but Hephaestus rescues them and raises them as his own).

[philcom55]

For anyone who hasn't seen it Brian K. Vaughan's Vertigo series 'Y: the Last Man' tells a very convincing story about a world (almost) without men.

[Marionette]

but the human female is surely far more complicated, biologically speaking, than lizards and aphids. I can only imagine it happening in the real world at some time in the far distant future, and only then if there is no possibility whatsoever of copulation with a male.

Well, I said it wasn't far-fetched as a concept, I didn't say it was likely. But I think if you are dealing with stories that involve interstellar travel or sentient robots, cloning is so much closer to real science as to be practically mundane.