http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16552173
I suppose you'd have to describe me as hyper-sexual. I would happily have sex numerous times a day every day, and have done in the past.
I certainly experience discrimination if I ever choose to admit how much sex in a relationship means to me. Thankfully the outright disgust is often masked by an assumption that I'm merely lying to be macho, although being thought a liar is hardly the best of responses to a personal confession. I also object to the assumption that I'm a gullible fool who tries to impress people by falling into established stereotypes. It's not a particularly obvious assumption to make for anyone who's ever met me, exposing even more the antipathy people have towards the idea of a high sexual appetite.
I find it sad that we still live in an era of special interest groups appealing for special tolerance, rather than the sort of broad-mindedness that would help anyone who happens to be a bit different.
The last article I saw on the BBC about having a lot of sex was about a sex addict who was preaching to us all how much better he feels not having sex so much. Perhaps the prudish BBC, and the population in general, has some way to go before sexual taste is truly treated as a matter of personal preference. I have no doubt that if there were a special-interest group trying to protect people like myself against discrimination from conservatives and religious nutters we'd be laughed at, and probably rightly so, because we should be campaigning against bigotry in general.
It's frustrating though, to have a worthy article telling us all to accept people with no sexual appetite, and a worthy article telling us all that abstaining from having as much sex as we might feel we need can make us feel fulfilled. It seems all one-way. Why not an article about a loser telling us all how much happier he is now that he earns money and can hire a prostitute every so often? Why not an article by someone like me appealing for tolerance of those who have a high sex drive?
The bias seems obvious to me, in the selection of which well-meaning subjects to publish. The BBC, known for its current habit of putting up an alternative view to any opinion, however wacky that alternative might be, seems to have missed a golden opportunity. If climate change deniers get a slot, despite being utter idiots, I think my opinions should get a slot, being based as they are on a question of taste. Anyone who doubts whether I'll be happy having lots of sex is welcome to set up an experiment to test it.
Showing posts with label sex. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sex. Show all posts
Tuesday, 17 January 2012
Thursday, 21 May 2009
The drive to promiscuity
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8055296.stm
This is a news story about how brain anatomy correlates with sociability. The idea that sociability is an innate characteristic is not proven, since the brain could have grown this way during development due to environmental influences. Nonetheless it's as interesting a thought that someone might have a set drive for sociability during adulthood which doesn't really change.
What I find more interesting than this, though, is the implication that these various drives might correlate with each other, such that people who crave chocolate, sex or other drugs also crave social contact. I've encountered suggestions that people substitute one of these things for another: magazines are full of articles in which people mention chocolate binges that happen as a result of being dumped, for example. I'd never encountered a neurological basis for this before though.
We also have cravings for attachment and romance, as explained here:
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/helen_fisher_tells_us_why_we_love_cheat.html
Apart from the fun bits, such as 'we were made to love more than one person', I wonder if all these cravings really can substitute for each other. Can the 'satisfaction' neurons reach maximal activity just from one or two of these (such as sex and chocolate) or do we need romance, sex, attachment, chocolate and social contact?
Either way, I'm not sure that marriage is a good solution. Helen Fisher thinks that we naturally want more than just the satisfaction of one drive that marriage gives us. If one drive, satisfied enough, can satisfy us entirely, why marry at all? Why not smoke weed all day, or eat chocolate, or have a busy social life? On the other hand, if it can satisfy us, why do so many marriages fail?
It seems much more likely that some amount of substitution is possible, but that we really want all the cravings to be satisfied separately.
In this case marriage seems to fight against human satisfaction by specifically denying us the chance to satisfy lust, romance and attachment all at once. Once again it seems a less than optimal solution. Any long-term arrangement that satisfies our desire for attachment does us harm if it also forbids us from satisfying our intrinsic desire for romance or our relatively short-term lusts; people who are attached to each other should accept that what is now called cheating is a perfectly normal and acceptable human trait. We might also notice that this research gives a decent explanation for extreme variabilities in sex drive. If someone wants more sex than someone else, he's not necessarily more base and sinful, just as the other person is not necessarily more prudish.
Of course, we knew this already. It does bring us on to the complicating factor of religion. Religion is a powerful tool for convincing people that things are wrong when they're actually beneficial. Religious people tend to be far less tolerant of drug use (of any sort), promiscuity, satisfaction of urges in general and especially of lust. It does seem strange that God would have made us to be naturally unhappy if we follow His teachings. Of course, much of these teachings are not necessarily God's, but are part of church doctrine instead. Either way, we have cause to doubt organised religion.
This is a news story about how brain anatomy correlates with sociability. The idea that sociability is an innate characteristic is not proven, since the brain could have grown this way during development due to environmental influences. Nonetheless it's as interesting a thought that someone might have a set drive for sociability during adulthood which doesn't really change.
What I find more interesting than this, though, is the implication that these various drives might correlate with each other, such that people who crave chocolate, sex or other drugs also crave social contact. I've encountered suggestions that people substitute one of these things for another: magazines are full of articles in which people mention chocolate binges that happen as a result of being dumped, for example. I'd never encountered a neurological basis for this before though.
We also have cravings for attachment and romance, as explained here:
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/helen_fisher_tells_us_why_we_love_cheat.html
Apart from the fun bits, such as 'we were made to love more than one person', I wonder if all these cravings really can substitute for each other. Can the 'satisfaction' neurons reach maximal activity just from one or two of these (such as sex and chocolate) or do we need romance, sex, attachment, chocolate and social contact?
Either way, I'm not sure that marriage is a good solution. Helen Fisher thinks that we naturally want more than just the satisfaction of one drive that marriage gives us. If one drive, satisfied enough, can satisfy us entirely, why marry at all? Why not smoke weed all day, or eat chocolate, or have a busy social life? On the other hand, if it can satisfy us, why do so many marriages fail?
It seems much more likely that some amount of substitution is possible, but that we really want all the cravings to be satisfied separately.
In this case marriage seems to fight against human satisfaction by specifically denying us the chance to satisfy lust, romance and attachment all at once. Once again it seems a less than optimal solution. Any long-term arrangement that satisfies our desire for attachment does us harm if it also forbids us from satisfying our intrinsic desire for romance or our relatively short-term lusts; people who are attached to each other should accept that what is now called cheating is a perfectly normal and acceptable human trait. We might also notice that this research gives a decent explanation for extreme variabilities in sex drive. If someone wants more sex than someone else, he's not necessarily more base and sinful, just as the other person is not necessarily more prudish.
Of course, we knew this already. It does bring us on to the complicating factor of religion. Religion is a powerful tool for convincing people that things are wrong when they're actually beneficial. Religious people tend to be far less tolerant of drug use (of any sort), promiscuity, satisfaction of urges in general and especially of lust. It does seem strange that God would have made us to be naturally unhappy if we follow His teachings. Of course, much of these teachings are not necessarily God's, but are part of church doctrine instead. Either way, we have cause to doubt organised religion.
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