In human psychology, the male sex drive is typically attracted to a female’s innocence - where as the female sex drive is typically attracted to a male’s power.
Innocence is expressed in the female either inherently or the female may choose to imitate the image of innocence.
For the male, power can not be expressed so easily. It can only be partially imitated, but for the most part, power must be demonstrated.
Because of this, the male must either:
A) Demonstrate his power by maliciously attacking another male - either physically, socially, or psychologically.
B) The male must deny his sex drive.
Here we can see that the female’s sex drive is what propels humanity into a downward spiral of suffering. The female favors the most powerful of the males, and hence drives the males to competition (leading to nearly all the pitfalls in our society).
I’m not trying to be sexist, I am trying to look at this objectively. What do you think?
I really want to stress that I am not sexist. I actually think that the female mind has the capacity to be more forgiving and compassionate than the male mind, but those women had their reputation ruined by women who exploit beauty as a means of manipulating men. Both feminine and masculine psychology are neither completely good or bad; they both have their own advantages and shortcomings. The question eventually becomes “Would males still feel the need to compete if females did not value power as a characteristic in males?” I suppose that most males would still feel the need to compete out of habit, but eventually the desire to compete would fade out of the human mind.
At first, I thought that perhaps competition is necessary for the mind to experience pleasure. But, after thinking it through, I can think of plenty of examples where pleasure did not necessitate any competition with another human.
I am not saying that competition is bad either; friendly competition is “okay” - but when the competition becomes malicious, it ceases to be “okay”.
Peachy Nietzsche,
Your option A) as the only method of expressing potency does not logically follow from your premise that power must be demonstrated. There are other ways in which power could be manifested, without malice and without attacks.
But for the sake of argument, let’s say A) and B) are the only choices.
You imply that human suffering is the result of the male opting for A) above, correct? (That implication goes unsubstantiated, but that’s not really relevant to this discussion.) If it is the case that he opts for A), that means he is unwilling to deny his sex drive. Therefore, based on your reasoning, one could just as easily posit that the male sex drive is the root of all suffering, no?
I think that if one were truly trying to look at these claims objectively, the conclusion would most likely be that the human sex drive is the root of all suffering.
I think your analysis is pretty Nietzschean (masculine), but your judgment of it is very “peachy” (feminine). You have confused “good and bad” and “good and evil”, by the way.
Instead of just singling out the female sex drive, one could say that it is attraction which is the root of suffering, attraction and the longing for that which is attractive. The masculine and feminine sex drive may then simply be a reaction against this attraction. The masculine, being primarily male, reacts by wanting to control and dominate this attraction and the feminine, being primarily female, wishes to encourage the attraction by means of passivity and allurement.
Slight side note, but I’m curious as to the role of these relationships in human creativity, considering that males have generally dominated most creative pursuits, arts, sciences, religion, etc.
Competition is a result of resources being less than the need for resources. At least that’s what I think. Also, some think, (Max Weber), that it’s a product of the protestant reformation, (at least in protestant nations). People want to prove that they’re better than one another, or something like that, and WHAM! BAM! CAPITALISM!. It’s not that bad really. I mean, since most women are cheating whores, it’s not like resources are all that limited really. I suppose you might be right. Competition is leaving the human psyche. Look at all the bailout packages. True competitors would just finish off the opposition. Bailouts are for cooperative socialist pink-o bitches.
Human sexuality is constructed and can be deconstructed: even ‘male’ and ‘female’ are constructs. Theories often go bad when they start over-simplifying human sexuality.
Two weeks ago I was involved in a bondage routine with two men and a woman, at least one of us was tied down (and I’m not saying who) and begged to be whipped harder. A second gave themselves a very nasty rash and one poor soul took a dump in a bucket.
The male tendency to demonstrate his power is typically a function existing solely to impress a female. You can think of the “What came first - The chicken or the egg?” However, looking at it semantically, it is a decent assumption that males choose to demonstrate power because they subconsciously know that females favor power.
Here is an example… Two men have a conflict with each other; one man submits himself to whoever is more dominant in the social hierarchy, and the conflict is resolved.
Now, add a female into the equation: Two men are having a conflict, and a female is present watching. Both men are sexually attracted to the female, and therefore feel compelled to display their power by using it on each other. The conflict escalates to physical fighting.
If some other characteristic besides power had been placed in the female’s drive, then males would try to obtain whichever characteristic that may be. But, since the females are attracted to power, this is what the males try to display.
Whether you want to say “The female’s attraction to male power ultimately causes suffering” or “The Male’s demonstration of power to impress a female ultimately causes suffering” is saying the same thing, really. If we could only drop our egotistical attachments to this debate and not think of it in terms of “It’s the female’s fault!” or “It’s the male’s fault!”, then we could simply acknowledge the concept as a whole and add on to the discussion. In my opinion, it is equally both genders’ “fault” - trying to find out who is to blame is not in the best interest of this discussion. Let’s really look at this objectively here, I’m not trying to point fingers, I’m trying to discuss the concept without offending anyone.
The reversal of masculine/feminine sex drives (feminist males and masculine women) is the result of over-socialization, over-population, and generally it signals that a society is past its pinnacle of development.
But there is of course a reason why females favour power, and this is because it’s advantageous for their chicks.
And why do men favour innocence? Because they want to be the first to get women pregnant (and then to keep them in a state of pregnancy that lasts as long and is as little interrupted as possible).
Yes, let’s look at it objectively. Let’s look a little deeper at what’s behind your assumption. Males demonstrate power in order to be favored by females. Now instead of stopping there and concluding that the root cause is that females favor power, let’s go one step further and ask: why do males want to be favored by the females? I’d say primarily because of their own sex drives, wouldn’t you?
Men and women are each motivated, at a subconscious level, by a need to procreate. Men, to do so as frequently as possible in order to assure the best chance of fathering healthy offspring, and women to do so as judiciously as possible in order to ensure the health, safety and protection of their offspring. And those needs drive behaviors in both sexes for the purpose of attracting mates. You have done nothing to support any claim that the female sex drive bears more responsibility for human behavior than the male sex drive.
It is disingenuous for you to title this thread “Female Sex Drive as the root of suffering” and then proceed to claim objectivity, and insist that it’s not about assigning blame. You make the blatant statement “the female sex drive is what propels humanity into a downward spiral of suffering,” and then tell respondents to drop their “egotistical attachments”?
You, Peachy Nietzsche, are the one who introduced the polarizing content – yet you now turn around and say that trying to find out who’s to blame is not in the best interest of this discussion? It’s a bit duplicitous to imply that the responses to your OP were unreasonable (as far as I can tell, not one person responded “It’s the female’s fault!” or “It’s the male’s fault!”) just so that you can appear, in contrast, to be arguing from a position of calm objectivity.
Despite the psychology, the reality is that females don’t hang around outside pubs, waiting to go home with the next male that Punch’s something. In reality females look for strength of character, which is what gives power in today’s society. And the view that ardour is what leads to fights is also wrong, most of the time it’s too much drink. Men don’t start fights to impress females unless that live on a gypsy site, and even then the renown he gains among he’s peers is much more preferable. Men that want reputations as hard men, are driven by how they imagine other males view them, not females. Ultimately, if you attribute the success of a species, to the selections of the females of that species, then all that man has become would be due to the females selections, but this is too simplified, and not what happens in reality. Evolution has many influences, such as environment, population and disease, all these things shape a species development and behaviour.
I obviously struck a nerve of yours somewhere, for that I’m sorry. Nothing else you said really adds on to anything, so I really don’t have any reply for you.
Please share with me an example where a display of power was not malicious in nature.
Of course not. As humanity developed intellectually, displaying power could also be accomplished intellectually and socially, not just physically.
Yes
I can assure you that many physical fights which I have personally witnessed were caused for the sole purpose of trying to impress the people watching.