Comrade-Z
18th March 2006, 22:41
The following is a partial transcript of a conversation I had with my girlfriend over e-mail. Earlier in the day we and some other friends had been joking about me being a male-stripper. Later on my girlfriend re-affirmed that she was just joking, and that she really didn't want me to be a male-stripper, but that she was also sorry if she was coming across as "too possessive" on me. The following is how I responded:
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Whatever possessive feelings you may feel within the context of class society are completely understandable. Without those feelings, you would either die or be set at a terrible disadvantage. In capitalism, you really do need billions of dollars to protect one's self from any threats of economic ruin and death because capitalism is inherently unstable, and the next moment you could find your stock portfolio wiped out, your competition stomping you and your business into the group, yourself out of a job, your ass thrown out on the street, or, if you are really unlucky, strung up on a pole by a bunch of angry proletarians who got pissed off that you had so much money and who happened to have the means to get through your security guards. Regardless of our success within capitalist society, in the back of our minds this threat of economic ruin stalks us. Thus, in capitalism, it makes sense to be greedy and possessive. Your survival depends on it. That kind of social behavior has a lot of utility in capitalist society. Cooperation and mutual aid often has less utility. It's not in our self-interest to share, oftentimes, in capitalist society. However, a dramatic change in the way society functions would entail a dramatic shift in what behaviors have utility.
This affects relationships too. Currently, it is not in our self-interest to share partners. In fact, it sets us at a serious disadvantage in terms of survival.
For example, let's say a woman has sex with a man. That woman gets pregnant. Let's assume that this woman is not prepared to take care of a child by herself, financially and in terms of time, effort, etc. First, she would have been more likely to decline sex to make sure that she didn't get pregnant in the first place. Then she would have tried to use protection for the same reason. Then she might have tried to use a morning after pill. Then she might have tried to get an abortion. But let's assume that she lives in a patriarchical Christian fundamentalist theocracy and wasn't able to do any of these things. So she is pregnant.
Now, for her own sake, hopefully she has forged a strong pair-bond with her male partner because, remember, this woman is not wealthy, and she cannot take care of the child by herself. Nor can she kill it or abandon it or give it away for emotional and legal reasons. It must also be noted that she lacks a local extended family network that, in past times, would have helped fulfill the role of taking care of the baby. So she will have to depend, to a certain extent, on her male partner for support in this endeavor.
(This is, by the way, one fundamental economic foundation for the phenomenon of patriarchy that came to be a factor of emerging class societies 10,000-20,000 years ago, and which continues to be a factor in our current class society today. If the woman depends on the male for economic/survival reasons, the male is in a position to make demands to the woman--in other words, the male is in a position to coerce the woman and act as an authority to her. The woman cannot object, because otherwise she faces economic ruin/death. This also hints at why many conservatives want to restrict birth control and abortion. It places women in more compromising economic situations and makes them more dependent--and subordinate--to men. Oddly enough, some women seem to enjoy this. Apparently they don't have enough self-confidence in their own abilities to make decisions for themselves, so they want "strong men" to do it for them. This is what "family values" means, in practical terms.)
Now, let's suppose that she allows her male partner to have sex with other women. Let's then suppose that the guy gets some other women pregnant. Those other women then proceed to have kids. The guy must now economically support multiple women and their kids. He must divide his economic resources among them all, giving each one of them fewer resources, attention, etc. This would spell economic distaster/death for all of the women and the kids involved. Thus, so that society may function, society gives rise to certain ideas--certain social and "moral" norms, such as "Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt have only one sexual partner."
(And by the way, those ideas don't just appear out of nowhere--they aren't "handed down from on high," for instance. Material conditions prompt people to come up with and attempt to justify those ideas. If people can convincingly justify those ideas as "universal truths," then they are all the more strongly embedded in the social fabric of a society.)
Thus, we have the nuclear family as the most fundamental economic working unit of class society. Anything that threatens the traditional family threatens the continued functioning and existence of that society. It threatens that "way of life."
And what was the root of this entire problem? Economic scarcity on the part of a certain portion of society.
Now suppose there were no worries--absolutely no worries--about being economically secure. You had absolutely no worries about getting what you felt you needed. First of all, why would you spend effort hoarding wealth and acquiring property when such actions are unnecessary in the first place? You can already obtain everything you need. In fact, it would be against your self-interest to hoard wealth because such actions would place in jeopardy the entire social fabric in which you exist and thrive. It would threaten your "way of life." Keep on going with those actions, and you just might find yourself in propertied, class society once again, where you actually have to worry about survival and where you don't produce things democratically, but instead follow orders and work as an instrument of another's will.
Secondly, if you had no worries about your needs or the needs of your prospective child being taken care of, why would you feel compelled to attach yourself to one man? You and your prospective child don't need him for economic support. Why deny yourself possibly hundreds of pleasurable sexual encounters with other men when it is no longer necessary to stick with one man for economic reasons?
So, in conclusion, your feelings of "possessiveness" are perfectly understandable within the conext of class society, in which we find ourselves now.
As a side note, it is perfectly understandable that I or others would consider being a male-stripper. Capitalism is a coldly rational system in which everything is ultimately subordinated to the quest for profit . Everything comes to have an exchange value. Everything is commodified, including sex. In other words, male-strippers are a natural product of capitalism and class society in general. So are female prostitution, profit-making hedonism, etc.
In fact, capitalism works as a corrosive acid that eats away at all traditional social mores. There are many capitalists who don't give a shit about what the bible says about alcohol, sex, pornography, etc. All they care about is making a profit from selling beer, sex, and porn magazines. That's why there are people like [my liberation theology English teacher, name removed to protect the guilty] who opposes capitalism. He sees that capitalism leads to all of this "indulgence in sin." He wants to get rid of capitalism and go "back to feudalism" where devotion to god instead of the coldly rational pursuit of profit was the main motivating factor in society.
I oppose capitalism for totally different reasons. Ultimately, capitalists don't care about your pleasure or mine. They just want to make money off of us. We won't be able to experience the full scope of possible pleasure until we take control of our own lives. That means stateless classless society.
I am sorry to dwell on such a heavy topic, but I've been reading this book lately, "The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State" by Frederick Engels. It deals with a lot of this stuff and has got my mind buzzing about this.
-------
Whatever possessive feelings you may feel within the context of class society are completely understandable. Without those feelings, you would either die or be set at a terrible disadvantage. In capitalism, you really do need billions of dollars to protect one's self from any threats of economic ruin and death because capitalism is inherently unstable, and the next moment you could find your stock portfolio wiped out, your competition stomping you and your business into the group, yourself out of a job, your ass thrown out on the street, or, if you are really unlucky, strung up on a pole by a bunch of angry proletarians who got pissed off that you had so much money and who happened to have the means to get through your security guards. Regardless of our success within capitalist society, in the back of our minds this threat of economic ruin stalks us. Thus, in capitalism, it makes sense to be greedy and possessive. Your survival depends on it. That kind of social behavior has a lot of utility in capitalist society. Cooperation and mutual aid often has less utility. It's not in our self-interest to share, oftentimes, in capitalist society. However, a dramatic change in the way society functions would entail a dramatic shift in what behaviors have utility.
This affects relationships too. Currently, it is not in our self-interest to share partners. In fact, it sets us at a serious disadvantage in terms of survival.
For example, let's say a woman has sex with a man. That woman gets pregnant. Let's assume that this woman is not prepared to take care of a child by herself, financially and in terms of time, effort, etc. First, she would have been more likely to decline sex to make sure that she didn't get pregnant in the first place. Then she would have tried to use protection for the same reason. Then she might have tried to use a morning after pill. Then she might have tried to get an abortion. But let's assume that she lives in a patriarchical Christian fundamentalist theocracy and wasn't able to do any of these things. So she is pregnant.
Now, for her own sake, hopefully she has forged a strong pair-bond with her male partner because, remember, this woman is not wealthy, and she cannot take care of the child by herself. Nor can she kill it or abandon it or give it away for emotional and legal reasons. It must also be noted that she lacks a local extended family network that, in past times, would have helped fulfill the role of taking care of the baby. So she will have to depend, to a certain extent, on her male partner for support in this endeavor.
(This is, by the way, one fundamental economic foundation for the phenomenon of patriarchy that came to be a factor of emerging class societies 10,000-20,000 years ago, and which continues to be a factor in our current class society today. If the woman depends on the male for economic/survival reasons, the male is in a position to make demands to the woman--in other words, the male is in a position to coerce the woman and act as an authority to her. The woman cannot object, because otherwise she faces economic ruin/death. This also hints at why many conservatives want to restrict birth control and abortion. It places women in more compromising economic situations and makes them more dependent--and subordinate--to men. Oddly enough, some women seem to enjoy this. Apparently they don't have enough self-confidence in their own abilities to make decisions for themselves, so they want "strong men" to do it for them. This is what "family values" means, in practical terms.)
Now, let's suppose that she allows her male partner to have sex with other women. Let's then suppose that the guy gets some other women pregnant. Those other women then proceed to have kids. The guy must now economically support multiple women and their kids. He must divide his economic resources among them all, giving each one of them fewer resources, attention, etc. This would spell economic distaster/death for all of the women and the kids involved. Thus, so that society may function, society gives rise to certain ideas--certain social and "moral" norms, such as "Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt have only one sexual partner."
(And by the way, those ideas don't just appear out of nowhere--they aren't "handed down from on high," for instance. Material conditions prompt people to come up with and attempt to justify those ideas. If people can convincingly justify those ideas as "universal truths," then they are all the more strongly embedded in the social fabric of a society.)
Thus, we have the nuclear family as the most fundamental economic working unit of class society. Anything that threatens the traditional family threatens the continued functioning and existence of that society. It threatens that "way of life."
And what was the root of this entire problem? Economic scarcity on the part of a certain portion of society.
Now suppose there were no worries--absolutely no worries--about being economically secure. You had absolutely no worries about getting what you felt you needed. First of all, why would you spend effort hoarding wealth and acquiring property when such actions are unnecessary in the first place? You can already obtain everything you need. In fact, it would be against your self-interest to hoard wealth because such actions would place in jeopardy the entire social fabric in which you exist and thrive. It would threaten your "way of life." Keep on going with those actions, and you just might find yourself in propertied, class society once again, where you actually have to worry about survival and where you don't produce things democratically, but instead follow orders and work as an instrument of another's will.
Secondly, if you had no worries about your needs or the needs of your prospective child being taken care of, why would you feel compelled to attach yourself to one man? You and your prospective child don't need him for economic support. Why deny yourself possibly hundreds of pleasurable sexual encounters with other men when it is no longer necessary to stick with one man for economic reasons?
So, in conclusion, your feelings of "possessiveness" are perfectly understandable within the conext of class society, in which we find ourselves now.
As a side note, it is perfectly understandable that I or others would consider being a male-stripper. Capitalism is a coldly rational system in which everything is ultimately subordinated to the quest for profit . Everything comes to have an exchange value. Everything is commodified, including sex. In other words, male-strippers are a natural product of capitalism and class society in general. So are female prostitution, profit-making hedonism, etc.
In fact, capitalism works as a corrosive acid that eats away at all traditional social mores. There are many capitalists who don't give a shit about what the bible says about alcohol, sex, pornography, etc. All they care about is making a profit from selling beer, sex, and porn magazines. That's why there are people like [my liberation theology English teacher, name removed to protect the guilty] who opposes capitalism. He sees that capitalism leads to all of this "indulgence in sin." He wants to get rid of capitalism and go "back to feudalism" where devotion to god instead of the coldly rational pursuit of profit was the main motivating factor in society.
I oppose capitalism for totally different reasons. Ultimately, capitalists don't care about your pleasure or mine. They just want to make money off of us. We won't be able to experience the full scope of possible pleasure until we take control of our own lives. That means stateless classless society.
I am sorry to dwell on such a heavy topic, but I've been reading this book lately, "The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State" by Frederick Engels. It deals with a lot of this stuff and has got my mind buzzing about this.