sum of all parts » Culture

The Love Crutch

Justin — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 23:59:25 +0000

Love is much like religion in that it is an indefinable (though natural) construct that helps us feel comfortable and addresses our fears in the face of the facts of life – that we are alone, as we live and die. While religion and god make us feel better about the uncertainties after death, love makes us feel better about the uncertainties of life. Love gives us a purpose that satisfies our need for such far more than any 9 to 5 job ever could. Perhaps the only purpose more rewarding is that of creative output, which may help to explain why we see in history so many artists that swear off of love (and even sex, perhaps conscious of being too weak of mind to enter into sexual relationships without ultimately clutching at the straws of love), yet so few non-creatives who do the same. Fewer notorious creatives resort to marriage, while so many traditional 9 to 5ers fight to perpetuate brutal, even detremental, marriages.
Love, and the codependence that defines it, gives us the illusion of being needed, not just for being able to complete a mundane task, but for being the individuals that we are…very similar to the reward of creative output. As such, perhaps finding love is our selfish way of proving that we are individuals and are (as an individual) special. The more truly individual the output of our lives are, the less we need to rely on love (or another person in any way) to reward us by acknowledging our individuality.
Is, then, our purpose (not the mysterious grander purpose but rather our individual, needy internal purpose) to stand out and define our individuality? Is that why celebrity is so highly regarded? Is that why our ‘legacies’ are so important to us, whether they be our children, our assets or our bodies of work? Is love what soothes (or perhaps distracts) those of us who are dissatisfied with other aspects of our lives? Does this begin to explain why the further ‘up the ladder’ an individual progresses, the more readily they discard/exchange/ignore partners. Are those partners/lovers becoming less necessary because the individual has defined their import and individuality elsewhere?
Do people who enter into ‘loving’ relationships before establishing careers run the risk of dooming themselves to professional mediocrity by allowing themselves to believe that they have attained the ‘worth’ through the individuality that we are all searching for in that love? Do they then fail to try to define their individuality further (whether by persuing a rewarding career or expressively creating) because they no longer feel that need to self define, having done so via their partner? Is this even truly a shortcoming? I would venture to say ‘yes,’ not because of a self-import relating to the values I place on creative output; nor even because of the fact that so many of these self-defining ‘love’ relationships fail, but rather because defining oneself based, almost exclusively, on externals, makes little sense.
Every one of us experiences life in our own way, as an interpretation of electronic impulses, object densities, vibration…ultimately as an interpretation of molecular, even atomic, motion. Because it is our interpretation that defines our world, and because there is no way to truly see or even understand another’s world, we can only truly define ourselves as a function of ourselves. I suppose this means that we can define ourselves by the love that we give, but that is a one sided thing that would never demand an ongoing relationship; there would be no pain in infidelity or separation because that pain can only come from the loss of the love that we are dependent on. Were it only a matter of us giving love, the loss would be inconsequential; there is always someone within reach to whom we can offer non-reciprocated love. Unforunately ‘love’ doesn’t work that way. We seem to offer it only to demand it in return, hence the cliche pain of unrequited love. Were love to be as honest and pure as we profess, no reciprocation would ever be necessary to make us feel good about ourselves.
Defining one’s individuality with a ‘love’ relationship makes no sense because your individuality is being recognized by your partner and the value is placed on it not by the love you give them, but by the love that they give you. You are using their approval to falsely boost your own ego and to define who you are when, realistically, there is little that is less individualistic than counting on another to validate you.
This individuality that is being chased in life, in the hopes of establishing a legacy in death, ties back into religion, in that both help to give us hope that death is not finality. Religion lets us believe that we will actually go on living after death, while our legacy lets us believe that we won’t disappear from earth after death; that we will somehow live on in the minds of those still living after we are gone. Is love now a reaction to our fear of death?
When someone tells you they they love you, aren’t they really telling you that they will sacrifice their own wants and desires in order to satisfy yours? That’s not real emotion being put forth; just reassurance of your own importance.

Grand Fetishism

Justin — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 14:57:54 +0000

Personally, I have a hard time understanding sexual identification, primarily based on the idea of genetic sexuality.

How can the population be broken down into women and men, for the purposes of sexual identification? Looking at gay communities, I can say that many men who are the object of gay male desire possess qualities that are generally considered feminine; similarly, masculine women are a mainstay of lesbian culture. Seeing such genderfuck in single sex communities leads me to question what it is about man or woman that is so different from woman/man. If the physical appearance can be overlooked and the stereotypical behaviors and mannerisms can be overlooked, then the difference comes down to what is between a person’s legs. Even then, what difference does the tackle make? Lesbians use dildos, gay guys penetrate, straight men like ass play…the sensations of sex are not genital specific.
Ask anyone to tell you about the people that they are closest to…most of the time, someone opposing the object of sexual desire (same sex for straight individuals or opposite for gay) will come up, so the problem isn’t an emotional block.

If it’s not appearance, behaviors, genitalia or emotion that defines sexuality, what is it? I can only hypothesize that it is a conditioning. As babies, we don’t know the difference between boys and girls; infants play with each other indiscriminately. It isn’t until infants are taught the difference between boy and girl that sides are chosen.

Is a person straight to fit in? Do they choose homosexuality to rebel? Was there such a dominant male presence forced upon them in their childhood that they seek out a feminine one to counterbalance it? While genetics can be blamed for certain chemical issues, there is no question that those personality traits based on conditioning are the result of stimuli earlier in life; either too much of a related stimulus, or too little.

If I know that I like dark hair, but would not rule somebody out as a potential partner just because they are blonde, that is a preference.
If I know that I like dark hair, and would rule somebody out as a potential partner because I need dark hair to be aroused, that is a fetish.

That said, it seems to me that Heterosexuality and Homosexuality are the two most widespread fetishes on the planet.
Don’t get me wrong…I have no problem with fetishism in and of itself; do what you have to do to be fulfilled and live a happy life. It disturbs me, however, to see socially encouraged fetishism on such a grand scale.

Generations

Justin — Tue, 10 Oct 2006 12:52:59 +0000

Age is much less a defining characteristic than it once was, largely due to the internet. Now that there is a meeting of minds before the presentation of the body, ageism is becoming archaic. It works both ways…just as I have friends who might have thought that I was a creepy older guy had I approached them in person, I have friends who I would have written off as naive youngsters had they approached me. These days, we get to eliminate the ‘creepy,’ ‘naive’ or whatever other generalisations before they even rear their heads. Now the first judgements are coming from much more accurate representations of who people are than appearances or years survived.

Folks are always trying to label and pigeonhole by generation…Baby Boomers, Gen X/Y, the Beat Generation and such. Traditionally, it works. In the internet age, however, things are less defined. Being thrown around now is the MySpace Generation; there are articles referencing it everywhere, but none seem capable of putting an age on it. Personally, I think that if any such name sticks and gets labeled, it’s going to be a much larger generation than we’re used to. All of us, from youngsters to geezers, were here to see in this new phenomenon and all of us joined it in its infancy; in turn all of us were equals in this new faceless, ageless universe of online communities.

I would even go so far as to say that we are a part of the first intergenerational generation.