THE BLOG OF DISQUIET :Qweir Notions,an uncommonplace-book from the Armpit of Diogenes, binge-thinker jottings since2008.
Monday, 27 January 2014
Of all the institutions
that civilisation has nightmared up, more infantile, more sinister than monotheism is contractual monogamy, its oppressive, mind-numbing, and destructive twin sister.
Evolutionarily viewed, men should have sex with as many women as possible, so as to spread their genes - thus the common urge for men to pick up (relative) strangers and try new partners. This is true also of homosexual men, even though they are not spreading their genes. To limit in advance, for ever, one's sexual partners is to set up a contract which is (like Loving Thy Neighbour and other Christian targets) extremely likely to be broken by one or both parties.
As for the "sanctity" of marriage in a Christian context - the ideal state for Catholics, both men and women, right up to the 18th century, was chastity. Only kings and princes could be married in a church before 13th century, and more 'common' folk were not generally married in church until the 17th century.
Auban--we can only come from where we are and we can only give what we know we have. This excoriation in poem and text is an oversimplification and as an oversimplification is self-referential and not adequate to the general congruency with the real and the known we have regarded as truth since Plato and Aristotle, i.e., Western philosophy. Evolutionarily, marriage is an evolved phenomenon, a social contrivance, and only in historical times, a contractual legal bond. The poem and its author's addendum do not acknowledge, however, (along with most others today) the real lived experience of the many beyond-the-pale who, as man and wife, live with joyful exuberance in committed monogamy, feeling and experiencing moment by moment that intimacy enhances every human sharing, physical, psychological, emotional, and intellectual. The intimacy of marriage opens all experience to possibility and to depth--friendships are better, conversations are better, loving is better. There are always failures and because so many more fail than succeed does not mean that success is impossible. Marriage is not a church-sanctioned prison created by a patriarchal god to further the birth of slaves and sinners and future worshippers. It is an on-going gratuitous awareness and glorying in the universe-- all its depth, variety, possibility, and sensuality--of another's being, that depth and sensuality are lessened by being distracted and not focusing (and hence, experimenting elsewhere). Not there, yet? How to get there? I haven't the faintest idea. Karma, perhaps? For gays, marriage is the social recognition straights currently supposedly have. The only gay marriage I know personally is based on the monogamous commitment I have just been describing.
The important word in my little tirade was "contractual". Or, if you like, "pre-committed". Which even now shackles people together. I think you are viewing marriage through happy and fortunate Western eyes, ignoring the millions of people who suffer arranged and forced marriages, or who make an early mistake and suffer for it most of a lifetime in societies where no woman has status unless attached to a man, or where divorce is impossible for other reasons.
4 comments:
Evolutionarily viewed, men should have sex with as many women as possible, so as to spread their genes - thus the common urge for men to pick up (relative) strangers and try new partners. This is true also of homosexual men, even though they are not spreading their genes. To limit in advance, for ever, one's sexual partners is to set up a contract which is (like Loving Thy Neighbour and other Christian targets) extremely likely to be broken by one or both parties.
As for the "sanctity" of marriage in a Christian context - the ideal state for Catholics, both men and women, right up to the 18th century, was chastity. Only kings and princes could be married in a church before 13th century, and more 'common' folk were not generally married in church until the 17th century.
Auban--we can only come from where we are and we can only give what we know we have. This excoriation in poem and text is an oversimplification and as an oversimplification is self-referential and not adequate to the general congruency with the real and the known we have regarded as truth since Plato and Aristotle, i.e., Western philosophy. Evolutionarily, marriage is an evolved phenomenon, a social contrivance, and only in historical times, a contractual legal bond. The poem and its author's addendum do not acknowledge, however, (along with most others today) the real lived experience of the many beyond-the-pale who, as man and wife, live with joyful exuberance in committed monogamy, feeling and experiencing moment by moment that intimacy enhances every human sharing, physical, psychological, emotional, and intellectual. The intimacy of marriage opens all experience to possibility and to depth--friendships are better, conversations are better, loving is better. There are always failures and because so many more fail than succeed does not mean that success is impossible. Marriage is not a church-sanctioned prison created by a patriarchal god to further the birth of slaves and sinners and future worshippers. It is an on-going gratuitous awareness and glorying in the universe-- all its depth, variety, possibility, and sensuality--of another's being, that depth and sensuality are lessened by being distracted and not focusing (and hence, experimenting elsewhere). Not there, yet? How to get there? I haven't the faintest idea. Karma, perhaps? For gays, marriage is the social recognition straights currently supposedly have. The only gay marriage I know personally is based on the monogamous commitment I have just been describing.
The important word in my little tirade was "contractual". Or, if you like, "pre-committed". Which even now shackles people together. I think you are viewing marriage through happy and fortunate Western eyes, ignoring the millions of people who suffer arranged and forced marriages, or who make an early mistake and suffer for it most of a lifetime in societies where no woman has status unless attached to a man, or where divorce is impossible for other reasons.
PS Forgot to say that I myself have strong monogamous tendencies. But I would not wish them on anyone who doesn't have them already.
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