Re: Is there something I am not getting

Hi Nigel,

Both Freud and Jung wrote about unconsidered, yet powerful drives and certainly the need to procreate is amongst these. Its interesting to think that since we have learned to control our fertility, these tensions may have increased. If sex is not to produce offspring, then what purpose does it serve? Well, of course it serves pleasure-that which nature has built in to reward copulation. But copulation in the same old way, with the same partner starts to produce diminishing returns. We need to vary the activity somehow, and that presumably explains kinks, fetishes and yes different lifestyles such as cuckolding. It is almost as if nature will out, drawing us back to the original purpose of sex-the instinctive agenda-to compete and procreate. .

I agree then that the psyche of the cuck male takes some greater thought. If he (like others) is programmed to compete, what is the worth of conceding treasures to others? Is it really possible that he sacrifices his opportunities to further those of others who he considers superior? It seems altruistic in the extreme. But to see the cuckold male thus is to see him in a naive way. We know that there are different sexual orientations and drives. For gay men there is no classic procreation possibility, but their drive and emotional attachments are strong. Being gay is not a habit, or a fetish, its a sexual orientation. We might venture that asexuality could be a the same-an orientation. Some people (beyond those required to be celibate) do not find they experience an urge to copulate. They are indeed content to define themselves in non sexual ways and strongly insist that this is enough. These examples, and they are long standing ones over centuries, suggest that human beings are not all designed the same way. The psyche of the individual is different. Just whether that comes about through nature, or nurture can be debated. There are lots of arguments that cuck males learn their lifestyle. They experience reward through submission to others. They eroticize defeat, coming second, being less in one way or another. If nurture is the mechanism that explains their choices however, I don’t think this necessarily means that they are damaged. We have always learned in to live in particular ways that have meaning for us. Culture facilitates this-just think of matriarchy in some societies, or the custom in others of males taking multiple wives. Human society blends different solutions. It offers different answers to the question, ‘what constitutes a meaningful life?’

What remains then for the cuckold lifestyle is to find ways of honestly expressing needs or drives, in ways that are considerate of others and which meet their needs as well as our own. We have to explore the frankly frightening drives that we have and to accept that we are different. If those drives are perverse and damage others, if they force our needs on theirs , then we do indeed face a dark world. We are on a slippery slope to something terrible. But I would argue that what more often seems shameful, awful, alarming, is that which is uncommon and which we know stands apart from the statistical norm-what most people do. Gay folk confronted this long before us. They suffered for centuries from persecution as they wrestled with their identity and yes then insisted on their dignity. I am convinced that what we do, if it is done with consideration, is liberating. Imagine the woman with the bigger sex drive and the wish to share sex with several others. Now, in many ways she is condemned. Even in erotic literature she is the ‘slut’. The promiscuous male receives little criticism by comparison. He is ‘jack the lad’. So at its finest, a considered, consulted and discussed cuckold relationship does better than that. The sexually adventurous woman is allowed to be who she is. The submissive male is allowed to be who he is. The bull is allowed to be arrogant and competitive. At our best we find ways to make this lifestyle work. We search for ways to sustain the different relationships within the union. I guess that is what we are doing right now in the thread I share. We stumble sometimes. We doubt quite a lot and then one of the others reminds us that we don’t always think straight. In some ways it is up lifting. We may write it erotically- this is part of our language. But it is serious too-about beliefs and values-living on our chosen edge.