The Problem Then, Is Choice

According to Dawkins, human culture has created a new kind of replicator: the meme. He describes the meme as a piece of culture (A song, an idea, a law) that can be transmitted from person to person and from generation to generation. After analyzing memes, their origins and their effects, Dawkins realizes: "Our genes may be immortal but the collection of genes that is any one of us is bound to crumble away...But if you contribute to the world's culture, if you have a good idea, compose a tune, invent a sparking plug, write a poem, it may live on, intact, long after your genes have dissolved in the common pool." (Dawkins 199)
This, then, is what we should really be striving for. I'm not gonna lie though, my genes do have to get passed on. However, having kids in our culture shouldn't really be looked at in this way. We have kids and families because we cherish the personal bonds that they create, not because I want my genes passed on. As Dawkins points out: "We, alone on earth, can rebel against the tyranny of the selfish replicators." (Dawkins 201) We don't have to do anything if we don't want to. Animal behavior is easy to explain because they live on pure instinct. They are born. They eat. They have babies. They eat some more, and then they die. Humans, on the other hand, aren't like this at all.
In fact, we are influenced much more by memes than our actual genes. Genes lay out my structure. They tell my body to make me skinny and have a big nose. They tell my hair to grow upwards instead of the normal growth, turning it, after a while with no hair cut, into some weird afro. They make my eyes green.
That, however, does not define me in the least bit. I am who I am because of the music I listen to, the things I've learned in and out of school, and because of how I perceive society. The memes present in my brain are far stronger than my genes. The clearest indication of this is that I have actually considered not having kids when I am an adult. This wouldn't even cross a regular "survival machine's" head.
As the architect of the Matrix tells Neo in The Matrix Reloaded: "The problem then, is choice." The immortal genes have created thousands of "survival machines" to do their bidding. By doing so, they have created a certain order in nature. Although lions and cheetahs hunt antelope, there is never an overpopulation of either one. It works. It’s balanced. The system the genes have created has worked since they began replicating. As these "survival machines" evolved, so did the brain. We, because of our brain capacity, present the replicator genes and consequently the order in nature, with a huge problem.
As soon as the memes began controlling our lives, we were liberated. Choice. Free-will. Liberty. Whatever you want to call it. Culture and its memes have been giving genes a huge headache from the beginning. Today, we are reaching the point where we are threatening the order of nature. This, is essentially what global warming truly is. A huge collapse was gonna come, one way or another. When we chose to do whatever we wanted, we took the reins right out of the hands of our genes. It's like when Anakin Skywalker becomes too powerful and starts destroying order in the galaxy. As much as Padme and Obi Wan try to prevent this, his power is too strong. So, like Anakin, our power has grown too strong. Although we set out innocently, this ultimate power has never escaped from our minds. If god is a meme which has survived for a very long time in the meme pool, so has the idea of total power. Now we are endangering the order which our genes have created in nature. Until recently we had no idea that destroying this order would kill us too. As much as we don't like it, we are part of this world and its destruction will send us into the blackness along with it.
Aside from this point, I also believe that Dawkins hasn't given enough time to this idea. If he says: "If it is a popular tune, its spread through the meme pool may be gauged by the number of people heard whistling it in the streets," he clearly hasn't given it enough thought. A meme is an idea. Whether it's a song, a dance, or a particular law, each meme has an idea behind it. The strength of this idea must be put in with longetivity, fecundity, and copy fidelity when talking about memes because it is exactly this idea that makes the meme last in the gene pool. I guarantee that Flo-Rida's "Right Round," for example, will fade away in four months tops, maybe even less. According to Dawkins, a tune is passed on by "how many people whistle it in the street." However, just as this song became popular recently through extensive radio exposure, it will be replaced by another one shortly. Although people are whistling it or singing it right now, it will soon fade away.
The older music that has survived has done so because of the idea it represents, not because people have whistled it for so long.