Name:Chris Country:United States Birthday:7/14/1985 Gender:Male
Interests:Music,Dancing,Philosophy,Reading,Debating/arguing,Rock Climbing,Reaching for god-like intellectualism (Diocentrism) Expertise:I'm an AAAS (African and African American Studies) alumni of KU. I'm a devastating critical thinker. Which doesn't pay bills. My real expertise: LIFE. Occupation:Student Industry:Education/Research
The following comments are a response to Datingish's post entitled "The Threesome."
At any rate, I think the key to a threesome (FFM or MMF) is either bisexuality or a voyeurism fetish. Bisexuality alone is insufficient, obviously, b/c there are plenty of bisexuals that are intensely dedicated to monogamy, but without it, a sexual threesome would quickly descend into voluntarily witnessing "cheating," hence the need for the fetish.
Regardless, for it not to destroy the relationship, there would have to be a shared perspective of what the relationship is that doesn't define the physical part of the relationship as (the manifestation of) THE relationship. If a couple were to agree that sex is physical, and the relationship is emotional, sex can be had with another person without repercussion (the agreement must be more than intellectual, though). You'd have to reserve the jealousy for polyamory alone.
But most people can't do that. "Love" in our society is predominantly possessive and a relationship is interpossession of the whole Self--mind, body, and presumably soul (the conscience, the corporeal, and the ego). Love is thought of as an act of (long-term?) Self sacrifice. Threesomes, then, feel like cheating because your SO's "love" is invalidated because they have failed to "sacrifice" their extra-possessive desires for you--thereby making the relationship imbalanced (mind/soul vs mind/body/soul). In other words, the spoken desire for a threesome is perceived as sexual inhumility and greed--perhaps gluttony--none of which is worthy of respect, but all of which are characteristics encouraged (more or less) by our culture by the pressure to "succeed."
Personally, I can agree that monogomy is humility at its best...but I wouldn't necessarily claim that extra-relational sexual desires are "greedy" in any objective sense. I believe it's natural--though carnal and base. Monogomy is unnatural but transcendant:
That said, I don't think it should be interpreted as a personal insult if someone is incapable of that kind of Self-sacrificial possession.
I think the reason that such Self-sacrificial articulations of love are so enduring is because it is subconsciously obvious, it's inescapably poetic, and no matter what people say, it's not "easy" to do for a lifetime. It's like climbing on the cross next to Jesus everyday because your love is so great that your own Life matters less than the love shared between you and your SO (to use a biblical example).
Noble! passionate! poetic! dramatic! and most people wouldn't do that to themselves.
Psychologically, then, we might interpret the desire for a threesome (and, in many ways, polyamory) as the subconscious reaction to a psychic-suicide. Essentially it's a psychic survival mechanism, or the manifestation of the psychic struggle between our social and anti-social Selves.
It's difficult for most of us to wholly dissolve ourselves into any kind of collective identity. While some people might think that the desire for a threesome is due to an individual's morbid lasciviousness--and in some cases it is--I think that in most cases it is due to an unshakeable sense of individuality. Or, simply put, raw, unabashed, psychic fear. And, to me, a very valid fear. Not quite cowardice, but never really courageous.
So, that said, I object to possessive concepts of love. While I think that they are poetic and noble, I think that the possessive qualities of monogomy make it almost equally as selfish as polyamory. I think that possessive love is the unconscious submission to the (perhaps) irrational fear of loss. In this case, a loss of love. I think that non-possesive relationships (which might be de facto monogamy, and might not be) are Life affirming: they are more respectful of the individual. I believe that a relationship that DEMANDS monogamy is repressive (matriarchal/patriarchal) and is philosophically (not to be confused with morally) objectionable. Most importantly, I think that possessive love is transient. Like any other consumer desire, the "object-of-your-affection" will cease to be the exclusive object given time. I think a relationship's sole purpose is the emotional bond. When people push for anything beyond that, they are gambling with the permanance of that affection. You force it to mutate and change. You are inevitably forced to struggle against our natural inclinations against being "owned" by another person.
What I conclude, in the end, is the same thing that you get with raw, emotion: If one person wants a threesome (badly), and the other person does not just end the relationship. You'll be fighting that persons subconscious for the rest of the relationship if you don't. BUT, if that person speaks their desire for a threesome, you reject that request, and they concede without any sign of bitterness, you should make it a point to show due gratitude to your SO's act of Self-sacrifice. As little as it might seem to you, for them, it was a minor act of suicide and a great loss. So show some gratitude instead of indignation.
I'm okay with natural selection, but I have one major problem with the theory of evolution: xenogenesis.
Xenogenesis is "the supposed generation of offspring completely and permanently different from the parent." What I don't follow about the theory is: 1) how that happens aside from a spontaneous mutation in a single generation (which doesn't seem like "evolution"), and 2) has it been observed in any multicellular organism(s) since the creation of the scientific method?
From what I understand, the argument is that a single species has to be divided by a significant amount of space in order for the respective adaptations and mutations to become permanent. However, it was not suggested that the two distinct "species" are no longer capable of interbreeding--so, wouldn't they actually be different breeds, especially if they don't carry different numbers of chromosomes?
Also, apparently frogs are capable of oscillating a mutation between generations (sexual-asexual-sexual-asexual), but that's not quite "xenogenesis"--the creation of a new species.
The way I see it, xenogenesis is still an unproven theory which lays a long shadow across the theory of evolution in general (though certainly not overshadowing it).
So...anyone that believes in evolution have anything to offer? Any evidence of xenogenesis? Any alternate methods of speciation which might qualify as xenogenesis? Help me out.
I coined a phrase today: anarch-pacifism. I'm going to explain it in brief because the idea isn't what you might think/conclude working from a social-linguistic understanding.
Social-linguistics would lead you to conclude that anarcho-pacifism is unfettered pacifism. The way society imagines it, it would be pacifism under all conditions even if it goes against the grain of society. Which, in fact, I do feel that way. However, that's not exactly what I mean.
Anarcho-pacifism is an approach to pacifism that argues that violence is NOT the prerogative of the State. In fact, the State has no right to perform an act of violence against its citizens for any reason but to protect its citizens in the immediate sense. (No, torture does not qualify. What I mean by that is that a sniper could in theory kill a known murderer with a hostage in order to protect the life of the other citizen but a known murderer could not be killed while running away simply because they're hard to catch.) I take that further and argue that violence, instead, is intended and must be performed as an act of retribution. Whereas a crime has victims, the associated act of violence belongs to the victim or the victim's family.
To give a better understanding of what I mean I'll use the death penalty:
The death penalty is the State performing the act of retribution for the victim's family. That, to me, is wrong for any number of reasons. The greatest among those reasons is that if the family couldn't perform the act themselves, then they should be expected to learn forgiveness. Forgiveness provides infinitely more closure than retribution anyway. Having the State perform the retributive murder for them makes the family feel less culpable in the crime--thereby giving them the illusion of innocence. Also, that implies that someone has to perform the job of official State murderer. Executioner, to me, is the worst job on the planet. Whether you're religious or not, it implies that someone is spiritually or emotionally accountable for ending someone's life. That is a heavy burden to bear. And it is a yoke that can only be bore by scapegoating: 'well so and so is a terrible human being and the world is better off without them' or 'It's my job.' Remember that the murderer being murdered probably has an excuse as well, it's just that we've decided that their excuse isn't socially acceptable. But in an objective sense, neither is really better than the other. Life is life, and it is always valuable irrespective of the individual.
Anarcho-pacifism is my attempt at striking a balance between the respect for life and a respect for individual emotional needs.
