Thoughts On Sexual Variety

[Sesklo]

I think I'm going to employ DPW's fantasy sequence idea. It's a very appealing way to present ones thoughts!

<fantasy>

I walk into a room full of people. A man greets me at the door, welcoming me to the summer Objectivist Conference. He says, "Hey, we don't care if you are ARI or TOC. As long as you respect reason and appeal only to reality as your final arbitrator, then you are welcome! Please help yourself to the chocolate cake and candy and strawberry punch!"

I see a man in a corner, gnawing on a banana while exclaiming, "mmm, potassium!"

I strike up conversation with a man next to a punch bowl who compliments me on my "What Would Aristotle Think" bracelet. He says, "Hey, I don't care if you are a woman, I still think that you can use your mind! I DON'T think that the proper role of woman is hero worship, and I don't think that the most feminine of all looks is the look of being chained! In fact, I believe that even Rand may have said some things that were incorrect at times."

I proceed to my seat, and listen to the lecture. Afterwards, I am invited out by several other people at the conference. We go out, and instead of ignoring me or saying rude things about needing to get more women to the conferences, they engage in intelligent conversation with me. It is a splendid evening, and we all agree to meet again next year.

</fantasy>

That was invigorating! I am relatively new to Objectivism (a little over 3 years), so perhaps I do not understand why ARI/TOC are so argumentative with each other. The points they make off one another seem trivial.

It also seems that although at the conference I attended, the men bemoan the dearth of single females, they do many things to repel that very group of people. So many Objectivist men I meet seem to honestly believe the rubbish about the role of a female being hero worship, or that women are somehow weaker or want to be owned/possessed/dominated. They truly do not understand my criticisms of Dominique as a heroine. (My criticism being that she was not good enough for Roark because she was not a producer of anything.) Bah!

[coirecfox]

Yea...I need to find an Objectivist dating site...if there are none i need to start one.

[Elle]

You know, while I am certainly not "prissy" and no one would consider me a "metrosexual," some of us have eyebrows that desperately need plucking once in a while! 

I agree. There's nothing wrong with guys who attempt to beat back the uni-brow look.

[AshRyan]

I agree. There's nothing wrong with guys who attempt to beat back the uni-brow look. 

I forgot I posted that!

[AshRyan]

That was invigorating! I am relatively new to Objectivism (a little over 3 years), so perhaps I do not understand why ARI/TOC are so argumentative with each other. The points they make off one another seem trivial.

It also seems that although at the conference I attended, the men bemoan the dearth of single females, they do many things to repel that very group of people. So many Objectivist men I meet seem to honestly believe the rubbish about the role of a female being hero worship, or that women are somehow weaker or want to be owned/possessed/dominated. They truly do not understand my criticisms of Dominique as a heroine. (My criticism being that she was not good enough for Roark because she was not a producer of anything.) Bah!

A few points:

If you want to understand the argument between ARI and TOC, do a search on this site--it has been discussed here several times. The points of disagreement are hardly trivial.

Next, I'm curious--which conference did you attend? I've been at the last two, and I didn't notice either a lack of women, or any complaints about such a lack.

I think most Objectivists agree with the idea of hero worship--but if you take that to mean that women "want to be owned/possessed/dominated" then I think that's a straw man, because I doubt many Objectivists would hold anything resembling that view. (As for Dominique, I think if you put it in the context of the story you can see that she has many virtues and will have no problem being a productive person after the end of the novel now that she has realized that Roark is right.)

[A.West]

I think casual, values-free sex is a bad idea. Actually, spending much time with people you don't care about or respect very much is a bad idea generally, whether in or out of bed. There should at least be a solid basis of mutual admiration before getting intimate, I think, but one need not know everything either.

I've got a story in my own life that might help. I was dateless through high school, and spent most of my free time rationalistically learning Objectivism. My desire for dating was high, but really, I didn't deserve the time of day from most healthy girls, and fortunately, I didn't have a real opportunity to make mistakes with the opposite sex.

In college, I continued to build my knowledge of the world, philosophy, and profession. There were perhaps a couple of almost-dates, but I still wasn't that happy with myself, and naturally was not a match for any women who would have been appealing to me. Perhaps I could have lowered my standards by looking through pool-halls for drunks, etc., but that is just repulsive to me.

When I started working, I progressed quickly through the ranks of a small, entrepreneurial company, and achieved some measure of professional success and finally began to build greater self-confidence based upon tangible achievements. There were a couple of crushes I went through, but much of this was due to the psychological error of projection - assigning values to people based on their looks, or one's hopes, not on reality. Not that they were bad, just not as great as I thought at the time. Perhaps that clash between my perception and their reality, and my own ineptness with women, ensured that no romance ensued.

A few years later, I met a very nice lady at an Objectivist conference. I was in love, but I don't think I was ever quite right for her. We had mutually enjoyable conversations, exchanges, and meetings but were geographically distant, and though romance seemed tantilizingly close, it never clicked for her.

After a heartbreaking end to my thoughts of a romantic future with this girl, I went home and decided I'd probably be single all my life, that I'd never meet a woman who philosophically and physicallly would inspire me. And I wasn't interested in having relationships with women who didn't provide that spark.

Within weeks after this I met a woman, who, while not an Objectivist, was rational, ambitious, egoistic, and pretty. Though I was a bit dulled emotionally, perhaps that helped me. After a couple of meetings, I gave her a copy of Atlas Shrugged. And she actually read it, despite the fact that it was a terrible time for her to be reading an 1100 page book, and she loved it, and it clarified the conflicts she had been struggling with all her life, and inspired her to do great things in America as Ayn Rand did. Things turned romantic after about a month of dating, before we knew everything about another, but after we knew each other's basic view of life and personality. A year later we married. At some point between we learned of each others' past romantic histories, and she learned of how I'd always been waiting for an ideal woman. From her perspective, that was VERY important, as she could not bear a man who had casually screwed women, or serial-sex-dated. She herself in college had enjoyed being the focus of many mens' attentions, but had kept sex out of the picture, always keeping in mind that some day there would be a more important man in her life that would be deserving of that level of commitment.

We've been married 8 years now, and our lives are focused on the practical implimentation of Objectivist values in our lives, and the life of our 3 year old daughter.

[Dagny]

A. West , that was a wonderful story! When I was a high school student a lot of friends and people I knew were very sexually active....they would go through mates like rabbits...never giving a thought about true love or morals (or std's!). I had to endure being called a prude and idealistic for not doing the same. I would end up being friends with religious people...not because I agreed with them on relgious views...but because they were at least more moral due to their religion forbidding sex until marriage. I was still the odd one out in that group because i was always anti-religion.

One day I was lucky to get a wonderful advice from an older high school classmate. He was older and a senior...but a good friend. Because I knew he was sexually active I asked him if sex really wasn't big deal and if maybe I'm being strange at waiting and expecting for the perfect person to have sex with. He immediately told me how he'd first had sex with some girl at a club. But that it was meaningless and that he'd felt empty afterwards. A few months later he'd met his current girlfriend with whom he was madly in love with and he said he regretted having had sex with that other woman every day since. He told me never to change my stance...that I was right and the others wrong. Thanks to his good advice I've since met my husband and am thankful everyday I didn't just sleep around with someone I didnt love. My husband had the same morals as I had and had been waiting for "the one" as well.

[HaloNoble6]

I agree. There's nothing wrong with guys who attempt to beat back the uni-brow look. 

So what is the easiest way to keep that wretched thing from coming back so quickly?