If a man has low oxytocin, is attractive in physique and/or personality, has regular access to women he finds attractive, and circumstances that allow for privacy, then it's highly likely that neither his faith nor his marriage vows will prevent him from straying. And he will probably feel no guilt as long as he's not caught and doesn't have to suffer the consequences.
If you look up oxytocin, you'll see what it says about bonding. In general, far more women are endowed with more oxytocin than men. It is thought to assist them in being better in communications and relationships, in bonding with babies and becoming good mothers. It may also motivate them to prefer a bonded relationship with a man who can help raise a family. When oxytocin is released into the brain, it feels like love, a little is mild, a lot is intense.
The levels of oxytocin in individuals of either gender vary, and the level a person has is an inherited and fixed trait.
The level varies over a lifetime. For women, it increases with pregnancy, in labor, and in breastfeeding. For both sexes, it is released in strong emotional orgasms - but not by purely physical orgasmic spasms. It is increased between spouses, family members and friends by frequent affectionate touch.
Men with more oxytocin will tend to be far more faithful to their partners than other men; and the same for women.
This oxytocin factor would have an influence on how a person responds to his or her options.
Oxytocin levels also predict the intensity of jealousy in response to a straying partner.
I've made it a point never to "hit on" any man. I assumed from earliest dating age, that it was the man's role to ask. It was partly influenced by reading Greer's The Female Eunuch. Her arguments convinced me that a man would automatically disrespect any woman who made a pass at him. In the interests of getting some idea what I might have missed out on, would you please share with me how a woman makes a pass? What does she do or say? In what kinds of circumstances? Do you wear a ring? Did the women know that you were married before they hit? Do you think they wanted a casual liason or a relationship? Did you think the women who made passes at you were doing so because of your personal traits as a presumably attractive man - or did you see them as loose and indiscriminate? Did you disrespect them as people the moment they made their pass?
This post was edited by inky at October 12, 2018 8:40 PM MDT
A pinch on the a$$ is unmistakable. Unnecessary touching, on repeated occasions - I don't mean hugs or anything like that, that's just the "touchy, feely" types being friendly - but "casually" grazing my arm with her breasts, for example. Or making suggestive remarks in mixed company, flirting. I do wear a wedding ring and don't hide my left hand. Some women prefer to seduce married men - but they just can't compete with my better half. She loved me even when I was particularly unlovable. Bore and helped raise our children. Nursed me in my sickness, was my rock when I despaired, the only woman that I have allowed to see me cry since childhood. What can anyone else offer to compare with that?
This post was edited by Slartibartfast at October 13, 2018 4:09 AM MDT
We can allow ourselves to be dazzled by such simple and apparently practical logic but it does not really do anything for us. For one thing a man may have many options and choose to exercise them and still take care of business. And if that is true then is the solution to remove as many options as possible from men by incapacitating them? Is that what we want? No I would say has more to do with what is important for a particular man, what he holds more important and dear. Some men will say NO to options because of who he is and what he is while others will entertain as many as possible because of the same thing. And this quite points the finger at men. What about us? Most of us, if we are at all social, have far more options than most men, and while true we are relationship - oriented and true to a great extent what you write about "oxytocin" many of us are still quite susceptible to the attention and affirmation we receive to say nothing of the possible joy.
Social conditioning made a 'loose' woman to be less in every way: whore, ho, slut but a 'loose' man to be more in every way: stud, attractive, popular, powerful. And of course eons of patriachal society (read any religious text lately?) and the subjugation of females may have contributed to this problem. Well, if you see it as a problem.
Some say the need to see your genes propagate made it that way (hard to tell who is the father without paternity testing). And when bloodlines and lineage became massively popular (inheritance, loyalty, property, labor whatnot).
I'm not saying women are angels. In fact many of us are in denial, or are dumb and are quite heartless.
So you are not a man! As a religious woman I certainly don't rate anything in the Bible as "patriarchal", whatever that means. And I would say my "social conditioning" did more to encourage my "looseness" than anything else. By being basically the only avenue left to me to feel good about myself since I was neither beautiful nor smart nor popular. Nor have I ever felt "subjugated" - victimized on occasion but never subject. And we feel as great a desire to "propagate" - well that is basically what our enjoyment of sex was designed for! No I am not an angel which is why I need Jesus Christ. Not wildly intelligent but not "dumb" - rather practical. Not "heartless" but I know I can not save everyone in the world! Nor sure what I would be in denial about. That I have "options"? Men have their own rows to "ho" and they need us to do it whether they choose to believe that or not. We stand together and without one another we do not "stand" at all. Or so I think.
I can speak for all the Gods but the Bible is known to be dreadfully sexist (among other moral outrages) for today's standards. Religions are also commonly used as tools to control the massed.
Have you ever heard of this quote?
"See, kids are like dogs, you knock them around enough they'll think they did something to deserve it."
On a God note, I don't believe a good deity created sex. Have you ever heard of rape in ducks?
Interesting because I think quite the opposite Christianity (The Bible) is the only source of equality because God loves all God's Creation. So each one of us regardless of sex. We can't get that empirically because of course we are all different.
And apparently you are equating sex with rape - what is with that?
1. relating to or denoting a system of society or government controlled by men.
2. relating to a patriarch.
Sorry, but I really don't understand how the Bible can be anything but patriarchal.
The Bible was written by men in an age when women were not taught how to read or write.
God is characterized as male, the Father, omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent, and made in the image of man. As such (if you believe in Him), there could be no greater power. In Genesis, it says that God made woman to be man's helper. For this reason, Islam and many Christian sects hold it as an absolute doctrine that the wife must obey the husband and the children must obey their father. Until the time of Moses in the Old Testament, the male head of the household (i.e., the patriarch) had the right of life and death over his wife, children, servants and slaves. He could beat, chain, imprison, starve, rape or mistreat them in any way he chose with impunity. Historical and archeological evidence proves that he used these rights. Wives could be stoned to death even for imagined infidelity. Under Abraham, with the story of Isaac, the father lost the right to kill his son, but gained the obligation to circumcise him. Under Moses, the woman and boy child gained the right to complain of mistreatment or injustice to a rabbi, and he had the power to intervene and give advice to the man. However, the rabbi was always a man, one who was higher in the chain of authority than other men of the congregation. No women had the power to decide law and men still had the right of life and death over their wives. Jesus, though he seemed to be much gentler with women, did not advocate an increase in women's rights. Muhammad, in the 7th Century CE, gave women and girl infants far more rights than they had ever had historically up to that point.
The relative freedoms and rights most Western women now enjoy only began to be won by the Suffragettes in the late-19th and then the later waves of feminism in the 20th Century. We are still far from equal in wages (17% lower for the exact same kind of work, experience and qualifications, hence lower superannuation and greater likelihood of poverty in old age), work opportunities, and social standing. We still have severe problems gaining freedom, protection and justice from domestic violence, rape and sexual abuse and harassment. The number of women in public office as our elected representatives and in most areas of leadership is still far too low to be able to make a difference in legislation: therefore, in every legal sense, our society is still predominantly run by men - that makes our whole culture patriarchal by definition. Female ministers of religion, judges, CEO's, diplomats, prime ministers, presidents and monarchs, while possible, have always been rare. The fact that a few women do rise to positions of influence or power does not change the fact that most legal decisions are made by men, and most management and control in the public areas of life (big business, medicine, science, technology, transport, design building and construction etc) is conducted predominantly by men. Women's primary spheres of influence - in the home, education, nursing and lower echelon bureaucracy - have little impact on the public sphere, which makes it much harder to achieve what it takes to improve the average conditions of most women.
Patriarchal = relating to or denoting a system of society or government controlled by men. [Note the logic; it does not say solely by men.]
This post was edited by inky at October 14, 2018 7:32 AM MDT
We don't know that The Bible was written by just men. Has nothing to do with whether we were usually taught to read or write at all. Some of us were taught and could or we could have dictated it.
God cannot be just male - otherwise there would have to be a female partner. God's omnipotence makes him either both male and female or transcending male/female. To take the attributes of God listed in The Bible and assign them to men in general is just crazy.
The translation "helper" is just right - we are to help men. Which implies no subordinance at all . Were we subordinate we would not be able to help. Nor does that imply obedience. The New Testament teaches we are to "obey" one another!
To talk of "women's rights" is separatist and exclusive , especially in terms of The Bible. We are not separate from men and we stand or fall together.
What The Bible reveals that cannot be found in any authoritative secular source is the love of God for all God's Creation. So we are "equal" in that we are all loved by God. Now through Jesus we are all able to have direct access to God on a personal level. i.e. which we do not require a priestly or mediatorial class. Companionate marriage, in general, though of course it existed previously, is formally a function of reformed or Protestant Christianity.
Not sure when you write about "equal wages" what you are referring to. If you just compare women's and men's salaries across the board that means nothing because in business situations we are paid what we are worth to our employer and long as men are the ones who make most of the sales then they will also be the ones who are paid more. As simple as that. But you don't seem to realize that we are living in a time when we are not only paid well if we are willing to do the work and make the contributions but we own companies, are executives, and a major part of the work force. I am acquainted with many women in the higher echelons of corporate life and believe me we are substantially remunerated. And I have read back into U.S. colonial times and even then we owned property and were legally entitled to a third of a husband's estate. As well as other benefits as prescribed by law.
You ae making it seem like we must fight for freedom. When in fact we ARE free, as long as we choose not to enslave ourselves. We have absolute right of self-determination as long as we are willing to take it and bear the responsibilities that go with it!
Again your terminology is puzzling - "protection and justice from domestic violence" - when we live in a society where law enforcement across the board acts to curtail and separate us from that. Of course the ultimate responsibility is our own - we choose to live with violent men because we think we have no other alternatives. We are unwilling to go beyond that.
If your definition of "patriarchal" is simply that there are more men in government than women than I guess so be it. But I think in your thinking you are just conjuring up obstacles which really do not exist. "Patriarchs" are, after all, just men! There is no secret cabal of men meeting to figure out how to wrest power from us! And for myself I have noticed that male politicians or representatives often, or even more than that, represent me much better and closer than females, Because it is a fiction to believe that somehow we are all alike and all think alike. And such a fiction has in fact burdened us for ages. We are very good at commiserating with one another, but not so good when it comes to helping and supporting and congratulating one another. And the reason is because we become suspicious of those of us who really do well or even better than us = perhaps because we can no longer commiserate! Somehow we want to think that we all are on a single level and that is not true nor has it ever been. So when we do well we get only jealousy and back-biting rather than admiration and support - because somehow we think if one of us does really well then there won't be room for the rest of us. Such limited and "coming from scarcity" thinking prevents us from excelling and creates a climate where we are meant to feel guilty for doing well or having done well.
Have to go out with my husband now but hopefully I will get back to my comments later. Thank you.
Hi! I wanted to comment further on your comment. I would not limit our "sphere of influence" anywhere near as narrowly as you would. With respect to the home - most of us are going to be primarily home-oriented because that is where we see our strength and security. Which does not mean we cannot work outside the home - I would guess more of us do now than ever as far as paying jobs. But of course we have always worked though not necessarily for an employer. In a more rural economy we, as well as our husbands, worked primarily at home. And now I would guess that many of us work outside the home not just because we choose to but because it is necessary to make ends meet or do well. And that many of us would not if we had the option to just work at home. Who knows but If I had children I would have chosen to just work at home as well?
Many of us work low-paying jobs where we are unable to make ends meet without the help of a man. Just as I worked many low-paying jobs when I was young. And really the way it was for me was I just wanted to show up and do the work and get paid and go home and I did not take it at all seriously as far as doing anything more until I matured and realized that if I wanted to make it on my own I was going to have to do the learning and the work and put in the time and thought and ambition to do it. I became very successful in what I was able to do and am well paid but still it is only a job for me and though I take it very seriously I leave it at the office when I go home. Most of us if we want to get promoted to what you refer to as the "higher echelons" must put our work more front and center and put in the time and effort required. Which often we either don't care to do, or we have no idea we are able to.
To give an example - where I work our design team is 100% male. Not because we don't hire women designers but simply because we have no female applicants . We have hired them and if they do well they are soon gone on to higher salaries d better positions elsewhere. Sales team we have three women, the rest male. Now is that because we choose not to hire women or because we receive fewer female applicants ? Is it because men are naturally going to be more gregarious, outgoing, effective when it comes to selling? Certainly many of us are able to do it but many of us choose not to do that. Now our clerical and human resources staff -100% female including myself! Is that serendipity or just what does that tell us?
Also I would say you underestimate our influence in decision-making , both historically and currently. A history may tell us OK a man did thus and so but how do we know it was not a woman who made the decision? Just as in corporate life now someone we report to may receive at a certain level credit for a decision made by us or for work accomplished by us. Of course it happens as well by the same process that once we get to a certain level we may receive credit for work done by a man who reports to us.
I don't think it helps us to weep and wail citing chapter and verse of anything. Or to talk of "patriarchies" or "rights" or "spheres of influence+. Rather that kind of thing discourages us or immobilizes us so we don't do anything positive but just sit around waiting for someone else to do something. Which is not the way it works. We have to get out there and with our best foot forward make a difference on her own. Because anything we have to depend on anyone else for is not ours to do with as we please. But what we achieve on our own, even with as much help as possible, is ours forever and we can just go on from there. To me has nothing to do with "suffragettes" or politics or "legal decisions" but rather with success in the workplace and only as more of us are successful the more influence we are able to have. Really as is simple as that. At least the way I have come to construe I from my experience or that of others I know or have chatted with here on the net.
inky 