Eros Unredeemed
I start to re-read Dieter Duhm's Eros Unredeemed again, and once again, it is like waking from sleep to recognize the true idiocy of our current situation when it comes to love, sex, and relationships. According to Duhm, our incapacity to bring our full consciousness and analytic intellect to this area imminently threatens our species and the biosphere with apocalyptic ruin -- and I agree with him. In New York City, full of so many incredibly brilliant and beautiful people, I feel like I am walking through a desert -- a wasteland of love, abandoned, forfeited, of puppets allowing themselves to be pulled on invisible strings... or as Duhm's title puts it so aptly, unredeemed Eros.
As Duhm writes, "The progressive-dynamic sports shoe generation of today adorns itself with super-electronics and galactic hair styles, but in their hearts they still dream the same fairytale dreams of our grannies. The cars and the changes in fashion have become faster, but serious reflection on matters of love has not. If today we want to create a transition from a period of violence to a new era of structural non-violence then we have to totally change our priorities. The same love and attention, the same conscientiousness and reliability, the same force of will and intelligence with which humans have thus far used to destroy each other must now be used to promote sexual love. We can no longer confront the omnipotence of war with white doves and pious songs. Our latent fascination with war and destruction is too great, too sincere and too profound, whereas our ideas and images of peace have so far been much too weak, immature and half-hearted. Not until we have found something even much greater and more fascinating than warfare and power play will we be able to believe in the possibility of overcoming war on a global scale, and this something could well be sensual love based on friendship and solidarity and on a sincere, powerful, and erotic relationship between the sexes, in short, a true reunion of man and woman. The only kind of will power and intelligence which can enable us to thoroughly and permanently clear out the ancient martial nooks and crannies of the soul is one which is capable of creating the basic structures of a love-life without fear and violence. Human beings, who have sent space ships into outer space, will also be able to solve the problem of unredeemed Eros if they fully dedicate themselves to this task with all their will power and intelligence."
The "free love" or "sexual liberation" of the 60s was not a failure, but an experiment that remains incomplete. Just as humanity was not up to the task, in that epoch, of reckoning with the psychedelic experience and integrating the psychic and visionary aspects of our being into the repressive social structure -- the system we have inherited, which is now obviously breaking down -- we have not been capable of fully comprehending or integrating what the emancipation of Eros means in terms of new social forms and also a new living experience of the Divine. "The sexual revolution, which is necessary for creating a humane world, can only take place if it is linked to an equally indispensable spiritual revolution," Duhm writes. We are still sleepwalking: unable to confront or realize what is directly before us -- putting it off to a "later" or an "away" that remains vaguely on the periphery. Another hundred yoga sessions, another thousand therapy appointments, and perhaps we will be there...
Our cultural system spins like a hamster wheel, essentially devoid of new, original or incisive content. Artists, filmmakers, novelists pursue the same old rewards in a system based on establishing careers and making profit. The actual content that needs to be expressed is contained in the love, sexual and spiritual revolution that people still don't want to reckon with, because it threatens the structure and ideology they have been conditioned to maintain. Art and culture have been domesticated to serve the system of ego and profit -- in these arenas, also, a true realization and inner revolution is necessary for a regeneration of our world to take place.
Far more than another political revolution, which would end up with some new miasma of jealousy and power and frustration, we need, first of all, a love revolution, which is also the form of a revelation: A totally fresh and clear-eyed approach to love and Eros. "The historical double meaning of apocalypse is being fulfilled, step by step it is turning into a conscious experience of revelation. The 'Kingdom of God on Earth,' i.e. the sexual and spiritual power of love, can no longer be confined behind society's masks, dogmas, and institiutions," Duhm writes. The "revelation" comes when we bring into consciousness the patterns of the past, and then construct a new societal structure that accords with our deepest drives and impulses.
The same ideas that Duhm works through here are also discussed in another one of my favorite books, Pain, Sex, and Time by Gerald Heard -- though, writing in the 1940s, Heard was not able to fully perceive that the liberation of love, sexuality and Eros was also necessary for the evolutionary potential of humanity to be realized: He thought this energy needed to be channeled through new initiatory practices. "Modern man's incessant sexuality is not bestial: rather it is a psychic hemorrhage. He bleeds himself constantly because he fears mental apoplexy if he can find no way of releasing his huge store of nervous energy," Heard wrote. He noted that the tremendous force of the human sexual drive -- beyond anything we find in the animal kingdom -- suggested a surplus of extra evolutionary energy, which we will either consciously master, or it will destroy us.
We find our civilization has attained a tremendous mastery of techniques of war, while we have ignored love and sex, or treated it as something that we can't fully explore with our conscious minds or approach with forethought. Sex remains something private, secret, and shrouded in darkness. "Whereas the cerebrum is applied in war technology, in love man lives and thinks out of his spinal cord," writes Duhm. Even the everywhere evident fact that almost invariably (with very occasional exceptions) monogamous couples either break apart, or lose their spark, hasn't compelled us to deeply consider the possibility that it is not our natural instinct in love that is wrong, but the social framework and belief system we have inherited -- that we reify through our ongoing thoughts and actions -- that is deeply flawed and in error. As Duhm also notes, there is no contradiction between being in a couple -- finding a soul mate -- and freedom in love. The contradiction only exists in our own minds -- as the inheritance of patriarchy, of the "mind-forg'd manacles" which keep us from life and truth.
The lack of trust that we find throughout our "civil"-ization has its source in the failure of men and women to be truthful with each other. If your desires are in conflict with what society allows, you either express your desires and get exiled from society, or you make the best bargain you possibly can to attain some modicum of happiness and comfort, with the permanent acceptance of an underlying current of anger, bitterness, and resentment. Once you have allowed yourself to deceive yourself and the person who is theoretically closest to you, then you have created the intrinsic pattern for a society based on lies and delusion... You can then listen to the half-truths of our politicians and pundits without throwing up, because you are living in the same state of compromise. From that initial error, we collectively fail to safeguard or care for the environment as a logical consequence. After all, why would we want to protect a world that has betrayed us at its core?
"The liberation of Eros cannot succeed until we have wiped out every trace of the old idea of fidelity, which is based on the principle of the exclusion of others," Duhm writes. "Faithfulness has nothing to do with a ban, with a vow, or with a contract. It is a concrete love relationship between two human beings. I am faithful to him because I love him. My love cannot depend on the condition that he should not go to bed with anyone else. If my partner is an attractive human specimen, then it is normal that others should desire him and that he should desire others. Should we really be expected to show our loyalty and devotion by renouncing such pleasures for the sake of another? What sort of farcical, masochistic idea is that? Faithfulness is love, but love is not renunciation. If our devotion for one another falls apart as a result of other sexual contacts, then our love was built on sand."
The realization that the intrinsic paradigm for a planetary shift of consciousness is nothing "out there" but the internalization of a new mode of love that is shared, that flows like a river, that knows no fear, that has no need to possess or control: I believe that this is the next phase of the transformation of consciousness that needs to take place. Subconsciously I always knew this to be the case -- probably you did as well -- but I am grateful to Duhm (who founded the community Tamera in Portugal, which I recently visited) for bringing it out into the light of day.
He notes, "Humans will continue to butcher their environment, to destroy their fellow creatures, and vent their hatred on nature, as long as they do not achieve inner peace. And they will not find inner peace as long as they continue to rape love. ... This entire worldwide process of destruction and self-destruction contains one strange component, which I have never completely understood, but which I have encountered again and again: Individuals are not even interested in freeing themselves from the system that ravages them." Because an incredible force of historical repression and violence was exerted in this area (by the church, the colonialists, etc), our ancestors acquiesced, for purposes of survival and self-perpetuation. We have continued in the inertia of that internalized repression, because we didn't know better.
The mass media functions as an ideological battering ram, blasting us over and over again with idealized images and visions of the monogamous couple and the nuclear family: This unit still forms the basis of the capitalist system, as theorists from Friedrich Engels to Slavoj Zizek realized. The acceptance of intrinsic dissatisfaction is part of what the system perpetuates. As we learn to accept continual discomfort and dissatisfaction at the thwarting of our instinct for love and sex as somehow "normal," we then perpetuate this misery by accepting a world that we know is far beneath our true potential.
Nobody from outside of ourselves can integrate this realization and bring about this revolution of love, the liberation of Eros and redemption of instinct. Everything in our contemporary society continues to conspire against us: the complex of "Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll" is the mechanism used by the dominant system of patriarchal repression to distort our vitalizing impulses and channel them into areas that are easily commodified and controlled. The first step is to make what has been unmentionable and hidden into something we openly discuss and explore -- then we can embody it.
Image by theslowlane, courtesy of Creative Commons license.
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Coyote Love
Is sex irrelevant?
Playing devil's advocate here, I think humanity would be better off if we could just get over sex completely. I see it as mainly a distraction of the lower chakras, which has been necessary for our procreation and survival, but this is no longer true. Sex does support love (not always) and this is good, but I wonder if the same effect could be achieved chemically by releasing dopamine and oxytocin in the brain. I wonder if sex is becoming irrelevant to our species.
I think of the castrated eunuchs of olden times, the stoic guardians of kingdoms and royalty. They had excellent focus and willpower because they had no sexual desire to distract them. This is the kind of mentality that I feel we need, to be able to deal with the problems of the world.
What I would love to see is for our libido energies to be completely redirected towards compassion, and NOT sex. If this happened I think all our problems could be solved. Simply opening the gates for polyamory and free love will not necessarily achieve the goal of reorienting the libido towards compassion. Compassion can be cultivated completely apart from sex, and I think this is ultimately the higher spiritual path.
Naive
Hi Tristan,
I think it is naive to think that we can simply "transcend" sexuality, which, as Dieter Duhm notes, is a "world power." I also think that the concept of attaining heaven on earth would not involve the suppression of our desires but their fulfillment - and once they are fulfilled, I do think we would in a sense be over them and able to concentrate more completely on what is required of us for planetary evolution. As I wrote in recent Facebook posts, one reason I feel this liberation of love and eros is required, is that the amount of energy drained from people - especially young people - in the pursuit of sensual satiation is exactly the energy that could be repurposed and re-channelled for ecological transformation and psychic initiation. This piece only offers a fragment of my thoughts on this subject.
I think the key point is, also, that the transformation of consciousness on a planetary level requires a deeper recognition and reconciliation between men and women - and part of this reconciliation is the individual and collective realization that sexual desire and its fulfllment is not something bad or shameful. Also the erotic impulse, as Dieter also discusses in his book, is something that intrinsically seeks to breakthrough taboos and undermine social structures - because it is part of the vital current of life itself, that smashes structures like weeds growing through concrete on city streets.
The point, then, is to construct a new social system that allows for Eros to have its expression without our natural instincts being suppressed or deformed. We have to be able to master this power - and we can only do so if we first bring it fully into consciousness.
wilhelm reich.is the man who
without compulsion
I agree with you: I would definitely not proscribe behavior to anyone - if people determin that monogamy or celibacy is the appropriate course for them, they are welcome to that lifestyle. However in the world we live in now, I find that certain forms of relating are proscribed and other actively discouraged by the belief sets and ideologies that have been reified in institutional structures and in architecture, etc.
At Tamera, people have longterm partnerships - "soul mate" connections - that seem to be life-long, while also being able to have other kinds of experiences and love relationships, even spontaneous ones. This change in the construct of what "fidelity" means seems like a crucial one to me - but yes, of course, it is different for each individual.
Eros Unredeemed is an Extraordinary Book
I read Eros Unredeemed in early 2011, and it marked a radical turn in my thinking and in my life. Before I read this book, I had some weak interest in Polyamory, and I felt overall fairly neutral towards sex and sexuality. "Sex" was a game that I didn't have much personal stake in, mainly because I was never really a player, and I took my refuge in the spiritual and important ideas.
Then I read this book. The ideas in the book are provocative, seemingly ludicrous (such as: "Sexuality - A World Power" and: "There can be no Peace on Earth as long as there is War in Love" -- these are essay headings in the book) -- but then I thought about them, and I couldn't find anything wrong with them. And the more I thought about it, I started to see how the connected together, -- and then there came a point when the entire thing just clicked into place for me, and I have never felt or thought the same way again.
When people ask me about my sexual ethic, I no longer say, "Poly." Rather, I say: "Free Love!" Maybe not the best decision because people have no idea what I mean, but really, I think it's the best phrase. How could love be anything but capital-F Free?
If anyone wants to read it, please send me an email at LionKimbro@gmail.com with your address, maybe a little tidbit about yourself and your interest, and I'll send you a copy.
If you live near Seattle, and are interested, we can meet and I can give you a copy as well.
You can also order it on Amazon.
WE ALREADY ARE LOVE
we are love
I agree with you: We are love. Love has nothing to do with possessing, controlling, or holding. Those are deformations. Love is giving and receiving.
Imagine if we can re-create our society so that the awareness of being love is one that becomes universal? This is what Teilhard de Chardin said would be as powerful as the discovery of fire:
"Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire."
The more I read articles
Lots of visionary men out there...
@Surlytemple--I think what Daniel is offering here is great food for thought, and I think we need to be careful in aiming our criticism at people rather than arguments. We're all learning and expressing ideas the best we can to stir up change! Here is an article I wrote from another perspective...one Daniel and I probably don't see eye to eye on 100%, but one that Daniel and RS have allowed me to publish in several different forms over the course of the last 4 years. Shame is a powerful reaction!! Don't go there! :-)
http://sasstrology.com/2012/05/mars-neptune-and-orgasm-addiction-holding-and-sharing-your-sexual-energies.html
Adam Elenbaas
blank
No Remedy ???
Of course in todays world of overstimulation many just cannot seem to get enough of anything {jaded} ... love becoming just another recreational commodity one either has access to or not.
Every culture also seems to have those who voluntarily accept celibacy {for different reasons with varying degrees of success} ... as well as rape and abuse ... easily able to subdue or transcend such inclinations/impulses ... or totality unable to control such desires. {and virtually everything in between}
Some feel guilty when confronted with desires for more than one partner ... some feel guilty only being faithful to one partner ... many societies having much variation in these themes all sterotypical standardization aside.
One wonders of the actual practices of more indigenous people who value such as more of a sacred act as opposed to a recreational sport of some kind ... finding multiple ways to value one partner as opposed to finding multiple partners due to lack of finding substantial value in one.
soy!
disagree
Daniel
from reading 2012 the return
nothing revolutionary here
The proposals under discussion here are actually little more than minor modifications of our current cultural complex. It is closely related psychoanalytically to Wilhelm Reich's mistake of believing the repression was about genital sexuality.
The true problem is actually more complicated and requires a more profound reorganization of the human psyche.
http://broadspeculations.com/2012/01/18/eros-thanatos-and-tantra/
Jim Cross
http://www.broadspeculations.com
Counterargument - Bio and Anthro
See now, the idea of life without a soulmate as the norm, just an endless string of interchangeable lovers throughout life....that sounds like hell on earth to me.
But hearing it...yet again...isn't surprising. Human men and women are biologically distinct --> this is known as "sexual dimorphism". This refers to physiological/morphological differences among the genders that are related to mate competition or the actual processes of reproduction.
The human male body begins manufacturing spermatozoa at approx age 13, and it never stops until the organism dies. Men subconsciously intuit that they are the generators of an infinite reproductive resource - unlimited numbers of gametes available.
The human female body, however, is born containing all the egg cells (oocytes) that her body will ever produce, and they begin to degrade immediately upon birth. Women subconsciously intuit that they are the generators of a finite reproductive resource - limited numbers of gametes available.
Human males and females provide equal amounts of genetic material when mating and conceiving offspring - 50% of the genetic material carried by the sperm cell (though no mDNA, which is inherited maternally)...and 50% of the genetic material is carried by the egg cell.
And yet, the male does not have to provide any further resources whatsoever at that point - the child will develop within the mother's body, where 100% of the resources necessary to build the functioning embryonic body of the growing babe will be drawn entirely from the blood and flesh of the woman. This is the basis of the ancient archetype of the Goddess' cauldron of regeneration - the female body can take a genomic sequence and use it to build a human being. The male body simply cannot do this.
Biologically, a male has a polyamorous sex drive. This is natural. They are wired to spread their seed as widely as possible. Females, however, are NOT naturally, biologically wired that way. Because for them each egg cell is incredibly precious and they must provide all of the resources during gestation, a female is biologically wired for monogamy - to seek out a single mate/partner and commit to them.
This is the biological basis for the "polyamory - patriarchy" VS "monogamy - matriarchy" paradigm clash we've been witnessing for many, many years now. It's not that either polyamory or monogamy is more legitimate or more natural or more correct...it is simply that one system makes biological sense, and the other one doesn't. And in a cosmos that is the material and non-material manifestation of a vast, natural consciousness...bio-logic IS the logic of nature. A sentient and intelligent nature, of which we are an integral part, not a separate entity at all.
Okay, so that was speaking biologically. Now, to look at the issue anthropologically, the unequivocal argument presented here for polyamory also fails to hold up.
Very few indigenous cultures actually have systems of polyamory legitimately in place. In fact, in most there are VERY intricate rituals and rites and mythologically-based taboos practiced in order to support and nurture a system of basic, non-forced monogamy.
(If interested in further reading on this subject, look into Radcliffe-Brown's 1940 work on "joking relationships" among several groups in East and West Africa, as well as others in North America, Fiji, and New Caledonia. Also recommend Max Gluckman's 1956 work "The License in Ritual.")
Speaking generally of indigenous practices (while realizing that there are indeed some exceptions), promiscuity among juvenile males and females is often permitted without strict regulation. Any children resulting from these premature couplings are usually considered "without parents" and raised by the group collectively, and are considered to be in some way special, or touched by the deities.
However, once the initiations of womanhood (onset of menses, usually) and manhood (first successful hunt/visionary quest) have been experienced, this attitude of permissive leniency evaporates immediately.
As a full man or woman, a full member of the village/band/tribe/group.....each "citizen" has the responsibility to uphold group solidarity, to mythologically raise the axis mundi/world tree on the sacred mountain, to promote order in the world and discourage disorder. And when your cultural population numbers at less than 300 or so, there is no indulgence for ANY behavior that could lead to conflict or schism within the group.
After all, if one man selfishly chooses to have an affair outside of his legitimate mating-relationship, he divides the kinship systems in the area and sets different lineages against each other - with a focus on the lineage of the adulturer VS the lineage of the wronged woman. If polyamory were tolerated in such conditions, groups would split and survival could no longer be sustained as populations continued to shrink and become more inbred over generations without any new gene flow into the group.
So anthropologically speaking, polyamory is often categorized as a "maladaptive" practice...though, as always, there are exceptions.
Alright. That's my take on the issue, as a young woman with degrees in Biology and Anthropology. Thank you for listening, and may you find your Path as quickly as the sunlight finds our eyes with each new dawn.
sweet post
CatSith13---that was rad..thank you for the information--do you have any references ...good book titles?
Adam Elenbaas
recommendations
Adam --- As far as references go, I'm afraid I lack any direct sources. My comment was really more of a personal (and as yet still in-progress) synthesis of my years of anthropology and biology courses. Both anthro and bio are excellent fields for understanding, engaging, and interacting with the world around you, but when studied together the entire orchestra seems to suddenly stand up and take a bow; it really is stunning.
However, there are certainly specific books that do indeed spring to mind when discussing topics like these (study of humanity, study of biology, study of human-environment interactions), that I would like to recommend:
Symbiotic Planet - Lynn Margulis
Spontaneous Evolution - Bruce H Lipton & Steve Bhaerman
Wholeness and the Implicate Order - David Bohm
The Tao of Physics - Fritjof Capra
Mirror for Man - Clyde Kluckhohn
Conditioned Reflexes - I P Pavlov
The Archetypal Imagination - James Hollis
Synchronicity - CG Jung
The Passions - Robert C Solomon
Women Who Run with the Wolves - Clarissa Estes
And of course, anything by Charles Eisenstein. Alright, that's all. Thank you. ;)
What About...
CatSith13
interesting question
Hmmm. How to answer?
No, I haven't found him yet, but that's probably because I'm not looking. If I seek, I shall not find, for instead I will become consumed by the seeking itself, the ultimate hunt available in the human lifetime.
So instead, I wait and I trust that beyond time and death, our souls are already sitting together in a cosmic cherry tree somewhere, holding hands, happily existing in a state of eternal quantum entanglement, too strong to be denied or forgotten.
And in that trust, the path to his heart will unfold of its own accord beneath my feet, and Love itself will escort me all the way.
;)
counter-enhancement
My ma-male-ian experience tells me that an open, intelligent conversation around eros is a powerful tool for the conscious modification of personal and collective unfolding. Thanks to all involved.
I am not just a fence sitter, but a semi-permeable membrane transmigrator on the enormous driving issue of eros. And from my vantage there isn't just one fence but a whole labyrinth of phospholipid bilayers with a whole bunch of different channels to navigate. This explains why some people just go to the "blah blah blah" route of "criticism". The problem/challenge with this route is that there are highly organized entities (corporations, governments, religions, disincarnates) that powerfully manipulate collective eros. Just because they are highly organized in some fashion, however, does not mean they are, in the long run, going to produce deeply pleasing outcomes on the planet/mother organism. I think this is what we notice when we walk down 5th Avenue or engage 99% of media outlets in the US like YahooNews. If we think we have a choice, we best exercise it!
No one answer is correct, but as humans we have what seems to be a remarkable ability to take what is going on around us and put it into code/language, and discuss it to creative/destructive effect. So it is this discussion that so enlivens me, and the power of the topic, that I duly promote. In terms of practice, I will put it out in the open that I am striving to be more cranially-engaged with "my eros" and "our eros" after awakening to the idea that I had been conditioned since booting up circa 1983. I think most of us, novice or elder, would agree this task of eros-management is of enormous import. At the risk of sounding simplistic, I will bluntly admit that I find that eros is flowing almost everywhere in my life. Beyond those two observations, and after a study of Taoist Tantra, books like Cupid's Poisoned Arrow, and various other resources, I still lack a doctrine. The stance I am attempting to cultivate avoids not premature ejaculation but premature closure (avoiding statements such as "I'm monogamous/polyamorous because it's biologically, anthropologically and culturually adaptive"), to continue to engage the creative mental and intuitive faculties to illuminate what is going on inside and on emotional levels. In this way, perhaps, I and any partner can stay in tune with what is at all times a potentially rich and fruitful experience on the earth. I have no idea how to do this but the potential of it motivates (and frightens) me.
Addressing CatSith13's post, we could look through the biological lens from many different angles. Some angles might be seen as radical, but reasonable radical-ness should be paramount. While we are indelibly connected to the past, we are in a "now" that involves a different collective and clearly many different individual packets of material/immaterial psyche. Our biology interacts and adapts. Physical love, touch and exchange of eros can take many forms, and one can argue (perhaps teleologically; Darwin's oft-ignored method of choice), that Free "polyamory" (desire-based interaction with multiple people) in the form of non-orgasmic or non-physical penetration is exactly what we need. This might not be what Daniel has in mind, but it's a reasonable adaptation of his suggestions that could be considered highly adaptive "biologically". Perhaps we need, biologically, in order to survive and thrive, a rapid increase in organized advocacy for non-reproductive, structured non-goal-oriented polyamory between not just human and human but nature and human, cosmos and human, electron and human, all underneath a generally monogamous umbrella.
Perhaps we don't even know what eros looks like, and perhaps out of sheer necessity this will be revealed on a somewhat mass scale as has never before been witnessed on the planet. One look at research into the top searches on the internet will certainly show that we have a massive need to harness the influence of eros, and a massive drain on our creative potential. Without being overly self-critical, one honest look at my interactions with the world on a daily basis reveals to varying degrees the same. Perhaps, anthropologically and teleologically, our task is to see and to choose erotic strategies in a way that is in itself Free, dynamic and erotic. People have erotic engagements with computer images, can I not have erotic exchange with information on eroticism? Perhaps the engagement with choice, sacred rebellion, moving far from the Tao and returning to it... perhaps these engagements in themselves are erotic.
I'm straying far and wide here, but I do so to advocate non-closure (admittedly for myself as much as anyone else), and an agitatedly excited engagement with non-closure. Perhaps intellectual and spiritual non-closure, and the imaginal creation that springs from this half-empty cup, is our most potently sacred and homo sapien-defining ritual. In this way, neither biology nor anthropology speak against a stance towards eros that is essentially Free(r) as maladaptive, but rather provide information fields that enrich the debate by providing a springboard for deeper creative connection.
Again, thanks to all involved in this erotic discussion. ;)
Emory -- You have a
Emory -- You have a lovely, though admittedly rather dense, writing style...a joy to read. I read through your posting a few times, and I definitely agree that nothing should be swept off the table as a possible option for human culture and reality. We are nothing if not an endlessly resourceful and creative species.
I would say that in the end, my cautious message regarding polyamory can be boiled down to : Our biological physiology and morphology truly is Bio-Logic. Material substance is simply energy at a slower frequency. Our bodies are our souls in a different state, and it would behoove us greatly to listen when they speak to us through our instincts and inclinations....for when this occurs, it can be accurately said that we are speaking to ourselves.
Perhaps we are not meant to have a single "most correct" sexual strategy for both the sexes. Perhaps the most ideal result would be a dynamic, active partnership between the two (polyamory and monogamy) - some kind of synthesis, something NEW. Or maybe just a new iteration of the ancient alliance between Earth Goddess and Hunter Consort.
If anyone has read Orson Scott Card's "Homecoming" series of novels....here I am referencing some kind of mating system along the lines of the matriarchal society of Basilica and the year-long marriage contracts there in the City, which expired automatically after a year and could then be renewed or terminated.
The options for self-organization are literally unending. Further exploration in all areas and all directions is needed.
disagree
You might want to check out the book Sex at Dawn: through studies of the origin of human sexuality and cross-cultural anthropology, it offers a totally different viewpoint. According to the authors, we are wired to be polyamorous. As just one delicious detail, they note a study that proposes the reason that women make such louder cries than men during sex was originally so that the other primate males would hear and come to have sex with the woman in succession. This would lead to "sperm competition" in the uterus, and would also mean that paternity was unknown, which would have positive benefits for group cohesion. Sex at Dawn also discusses several human cultures where jealousy is unknown, and where women have the freedom to choose their partners at all times.
Sex at Dawn --> psych, not anthro
Actually, I am aware of that book. While I haven't read it cover-to-cover myself, excerpts from it were included on the reading list for one of my classes. Unfortunately, though, it was included only as an example of how the field of anthropology is often co-opted by those with little or no knowledge of its training methodology.
"Sex at Dawn" is not an anthropological work of research. It is a book written by two doctors with specializations in medical health and psychiatry and psychology. It's a prime example of applying the principles of primatological research to anatomically modern humans, which can indeed sometimes provide some illumination on certain phenomena, but just as certainly cannot be applied in one general sweep across the board.
Sex at Dawn is not an anthropological book. It is an evolutionary psychology book.
Thank you.
Maybe I missed it, but is
interesting, and...
And to personally riff off your point, I think Cat's anthropology/biology argument above, or a documentary on the '60s, provides evidence that it's not as simple as just saying, "let's open the floodgates to roly-poly-promiscuity and that will solve everything!" You no doubt agree with this. The issue is more subtle than that, partly because polyamory does not equal polygamy, nor does "conscious eros sharing" equal destructive promiscuity. Doing some quick creative time-travel, I might have benefited tremendously as a kid from consciously created rituals around managing, directing and living with eros, all of which may have been the result of aggressive experimentation on the part of my parents or other close tribal elders.
CatSith13 - consider the female perspective
Having worked on natural history documentaries for over 10 years, and having family members that are scientists, I have often come across variations of your explanation for what appears to be differences between female-male sexual drives. But I urge you, and all readers, to also consider just how much males have influenced scientific theories with their own personal interests.
Consider this - since women have finite eggs, as well as so much to "sacrifice" when it comes to reproduction, wouldn't it be in their best interest to mate with the best possible candidate to produce her offspring? Why, when there is so much to “lose” would a female settle for just one man for her whole lifetime? It is because a female has so much to "lose" that she may very well want/desire a so-called "better" mate when she encounters him...
Scientific reasoning is often faulty and is guided by the humans who are studying it. These scientists provide their reasoning, their theories, their likely possibilities. But just like a prism, there are many ways of looking at behavior and what drives it. Don't stop at the theories you learned in school. And consider things from a female perspective, the one that is often ignored in a patriarchy.
I know plenty of women that "stray", or women that are with one partner yet desire another. But in a patriarchy those desires are not broadcast for the fear of risking banishment from society or in some places death. At a very early age, women are conditioned - - they are told that in order to be a "good girl" you keep your legs closed...but for men it's quite different. This is called conditioning, and if you want to bring up science then you have to consider psychology when it comes to behavior.
Conditioning, and the oppression of female sexual desire, have to be factored into the how and whys of sexual preference. I’m not saying that there isn’t validity to some, perhaps many, women desiring a more monogamous lifestyle. But there are men who desire it as well. It’s so complicated, all of this…But if I hear the “spread his seed” reasoning one more time – and presented as if it’s sole scientific fact – I get uncomfortable. Also, you use the words "subconscious" and "intuit”; while that might be considered psychology by, let’s say, someone like Freud there are many scientists that would cringe when they hear it being used to describe animal behavior (and yes, we are animals).
Many years ago I worked on a show that featured some groundbreaking work by a female scientist studying the evolution of duck genitalia in the “war of the sexes”. Here’s a link to an article in the NY Times…it doesn’t exactly relate to this discussion, but it shows how much the female side of things are ignored by male scientists, and how it took a women to come along and change that. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/01/science/01duck.html?pagewanted=all As for this whole polyamory thing...I don't know...who knows...But love - true love with one wonderful person can be so f*ckin amazing. Cheers...
Roxy
Roxy -- I am somewhat at a loss... It seems that in your post you chide me for both being too much a scientist, and not enough. Too much a feminist, and not enough.
All I can say is that I have been equally trained in the subjective (anthropology) and the objective (biology), and that in mainstream colleges across America, they are already training the next generation in the ways of the new, emergent paradigm of integral, relational science brought about in the wake of systems theory and quantum mechanics. The theories you seem to be referring to as exclusively designed by male scholars are in fact no longer in favor, though they are still included in courses that are designed to acquaint the student with the chronological history of theoretical models and experimental designs associated with the field....
I am deeply concerned with the lines between science - folk knowledge - myth - philosophy - and pseudoscience, so if my writing comes off as oblivious to such demarcations then I am definitely failing in my desire to communicate my thoughts, and I thank you for bringing this to my attention. And I am well aware of the common phenomenon of disproportionate hubris among college students and recent college graduates, so I suppose it's not that hard to believe that I myself might fall prey to it...*shudders*
I shall think on all you've said, and seek to see my patterns of logic and reasoning through your eyes. Thank you for this lesson. ;)
Conception and Contraception
Which of course any fool knows is simply unnatural ... pills, condoms, operations .. pulling the penis out before ejaculation ...
One wonders to what degree present mankind actually has in his innate ability to take personal responsibility for this most natural act along with it's most natural consequence {the birds and the bees} ...
All erotica aside ... conception is likely to take place at some point unless of course one unnaturally takes steps to avoid such at which point "spirituality" is immediately sacrificed for material concerns.
Any natural understanding of sex would naturally include the taking full responsibility for any naturally associated outcome ... so just how prepared is one man in his ability to respond to multiple children from multiple mothers if in fact such naturally takes place.
How can one possibly separate spirituality from indigenous organic nature?
Most of us are self-regulated by our own abilities, individually and collectively. If we eat more than we require {just for pleasure} we get sick, if we spend more than we have we become slavers to debt.
So if one is pursuing erotica more than they can naturally take responsibility for than where does that leave one spiritually ... likely with nothing more than a bunch of excuses in relation to ones desires {however sublime} out side of the reality of actual necessity.
The very concept of "freedom" is often misconstrued as a mere relative phenomenon rather than a more quantum noumenon.
In other words there can more sexual freedom with one partner than there can be found in multiple partners .. more freedom acting within ones financial "karma" than in accruing more money through the manipulations of others karma .. more actual satisfaction in eating a regulated diet than in eating what ever one feels like.
Actual satisfaction being the proof of the spirituality of being.
Just some side-point considerations for the mix.
It's about "time"
The thing about most, but not all, non-monogamous relationships is that they are time consuming. Think about how long it takes to meet someone, get to know them, prove to their friends that you aren't some sort of serial killer(not necessary per se but a really good idea), have the conversations necessary to maintain the relationship, go out on dates, etc.
Now, if you want to have steady relationships you'll have to go through that again and take that level of time again. Of course, you could say that you don't want a full relationship, that you want something more casual. Even though this sounds like you will need MUCH less time that actually isn't the case. You still have to get into a community and get to know the other person enough so that they can trust you enough to be sexually intimate with them. This can add up very quickly as far as using up your time.
Now, also keep in mind that in most non-monogamous relationships that the other people involved also get to be with other people. This means that they will have less bandwith to be with you and, depending on how it works out, you might have to pursue even more partners because the partners you have don't have as much time for you as you want.
So, in closing, if you want romantic and sexual interactions to take up at least 50%(usually closer to 80%) of your time, then non-monogamy might have something for you. However, if you want to use that time for something else, it might be wise to either set that aspect of life aside or just get one significant other and call it a day.
community model
This is the reason that Duhm and his partner created ZEGG and then Tamera: They believe that this new model of partnership can only be practiced in community - it does seem like it would be time-consuming. In their community, the children past two years old live together in a child's compound... must free up so much time and energy for the parents.
I think this leads to another question that is worth considering: What are we spending all of our time on now? Wouldn't going deeper into love and partnership be a good way to spend it? In NYC, people are madly driven by their careers, and run through their lives in a blur of speed. They certainly "produce" a lot of stuff, but what use is all of this stuff, ultimately?
I remember that John Lilly who studied dolphins (a seemingly quite joyful and I believe thoroughly "polyamorous" species) and their communication ended up proposing that dolphin language was mainly used to comment upon and indicate extremly subtle variations in relationships between the dolphins. In other words, exploring and experimenting and researching the nature of love is the full-time occupation of the dolphin experience. And what are we doing with our time again?
Good morning, I'm not
Good morning,
I'm not familiar with Tamera but I am familiar with ZEGG(I have a lot of experience with many strains of non-monogamy). I can tell you from observation that being a part of ZEGG or even being part of a ZEGG inspired community(such as Center for a New Culture here in the US) is a full time job. Oddly enough, adding non-monogamy to the mix adds to the time required but not as much as if someone was not living in community.
If you haven't already and can spare the time investment, I would recommend you check out the Center for a New Culture summer camp(http://www.cfnc.us/) The group is very much inspired by the ZEGG forum and works with a lot of the ideas you forwarded in this essay.
I think that how we spend our time is a very important question. I wouldn't dream of telling people what uses of time are "superior" but I think it is critical to understand the price one will pay. With the exception of one possible configuration(in which a person has a single significant other and that significant other has several other people they are romantic with) such things as extended religious retreats or long term projects become significantly more challenging(if not out and out impossible).
At the end of the day I think it depends on what the individual wants out of their life. For certain people in certain circumstances non-monogamy and the skill set it teaches can be vastly rewarding. I know people for whom non-monogamy is their life and, despite the challenges, this makes them and their community very happy.
Also, in the spirit of full disclosure I wish to state that I was involved in a polyamorous relationship for six and a half years and it ended very painfully in early September of 2011. To be blunt, I am not a fan of non-monogamy.
This is just too much work
This just sounds like so much work and too much trouble.
Wouldn't it just be easier to find the right person to love and have children with them?
And don't get me started on taking two-year-olds away from their parents so their parents can have polyamorous encounters. How selfish.
I hope you aren't looking for disagreement from me
I agree that, for me at least, that non-monogamy is like working 20 hours for a turnip. Lots of work, very little pay off.
However, if I am being honest I have encountered some peoplethat wouldn't live their life any other way. They tend to have a very specific set of circumstances and a very particular temperment.
To elaborate a little more, if you are in a relatively large community where non-monogamy is already common that is the circumstances(San Francisco is ideal but New York City is ok too). Also you need to be the type of person who doesn't get super attatched to any particular person they are with, is willing to spend a lot of time communicating, has excellent time management skills, is good at negotiating, and really enjoys the courting and dating process as much if not more than being in a relationship.
And even then you can still spend a lot of time alone so you should be good at being alone. In brief, I think non-monogamy is a sucker's game.
(in response to "it's too much work")
it's a terrible thing to reply to old comments I think,
but what you wrote is just so incredibly shitty,
that I really had to say so.
not everyone is like you.
thank you for reading.
Not needing others for sex is probably the best of all
Seriously Missing the Point
Tantric mastery
I agree with this perspective. I think of the Indian tantrics. Everyone loves to focus on their sexual magic and rituals, but no one seems to remember what I consider to be one of the most important teachings of tantra: that the purpose of it is to ritualize internally, to transcend the need to worship any exterior religious objects and focus on finding divinity within the human body and spirit. I see polyamory as often being a striving after external objects to satisfy an internal emptiness. The ultimate achivement of tantric sex is absolute union, or yoga, with one other person. This could take years of practice to achieve.
While there's no doubt that many tantrics have been sleeping around quite a bit through the years, I wonder about those practitioners who have moved beyond sex, beyond the Root and Sacral chakras, and taken their practice into the higher chakras like Heart, Throat, Third Eye, and Crown. Of course, tantrics would still include the lower chakras into their practice, as mastery of the lower ones is needed to activate higher chakras, but I wonder if sex ceases to be as important after this mastery is attained.
janetp, bringing the voice
janetp, bringing the voice of wisdom. there's a vast lack of discernment here between "freedom and love" and "doing whatever the hell my genitals order me to do", dressed up in multisyllabic words and the abuse of evolutionary biology theory to justify "whatever the hell my genitals decide is awesome for me".
Really, honestly, truly, the world does not rotate, enlightenment does not occur, peace is not dependent upon, nor does tomorrow's sun rise based on one's ability to do the nasty. I know the horny folks want to believe differently, but sexuality is only one lovely, sticky, messy path among many, and to claim more than that is juvenile and foolish.
And to whoever gender-ID'd me above, I wouldn't assume I'm female. or even cis-gendered. I am definitely surly.
Really, honestly, truly.
The world rotates, enlightenment occurs, and peace depends on -- our capacity to be earnest and sincere about who we are, how we feel, and whom we love.
that might be true...but
{;)}=
Some great sources
Natural man (not sexist simply using historical terminology)
Through the tunnels by
It ain't easy
Eros
The ancient philosopher Plato developed an idealistic concept of Eros which would prove to be very influential in modern times. In general, Plato did not consider physical attraction to be a necessary part of love. "Platonic love" in this original sense is examined in Plato's dialogue the Symposium, which has as its topic the subject of love or Eros. In this dialogue Plato argues that Eros is initially felt for a person, but that with contemplation it can become an appreciation for the beauty within that person, or even an appreciation for beauty itself in an ideal sense. As Plato expresses it, Eros can help the soul to "remember" Beauty in its pure form.
It follows from this, for Plato, that Eros can contribute to an understanding of Truth. Ultimately, Plato considers Eros to be a longing for wholeness or completeness, a daemon whose aim is to reach wisdom without ever owning her. In that sense Eros is synonymous with philosophy, which literally means the love or desire of wisdom. And since wisdom is the greatest of virtues, Eros is therefore the desire for the greatest of goods.