A reader of my blog who saw my post this morning on the Phillip Weiss/monogamy article directed me to the recent XX Factor response by Tim Noah. Noah certainly makes some good observations, and like him, I argue that Weiss simply misses the XX boat.

For me, the real question is why does simple human attraction necessarily have to lead to conquering a woman or marital infidelity. I write:

For a number of reasons, both medical and emotional, most of us are not wired for a long-term, adult, emotionally committed relationship in which our partners get free passes to do other people. We are, however, wired for attraction, and we are wired for curiosity, and we are wired for fantasy. What is interesting to me is why Weiss makes the assumption that to want is to have.

Feel free to read the rest (and respond) at <link> but I would also like to know if women agree with Noah's and my assertions about possession, infidelity, and acquisition.

I quite enjoyed your post (though you might want to fix the link, it has a comma hanging off the end.)

You point out Weiss' assertion that women do not share interest in sex or diversity of partners. I agree that it's largely unfounded, and could be explained more easily by Weiss' obvious narcassism. I mean, after all, if women are truly as sexless and monogamous as he claims, he must be a stallion, to attract so many lovers. He is, in essense, claiming that monogamous women are so turned on by him they flee from their one-partner ways (unless there really are that many single, aka unmarried AND undating, women in the area) and momentarily enflame their sexless drives.

I also strongly agree that there is an undercurrent of ownership, which ties in with the narcassism. If Weiss were truly wired for multiple partners, that should also imply that he doesn't mind HIS partner having multiple partners... after all, it is the most natural thing in the world. But he abandons multiple partners after he realizes his wife would take part in the festivities, as well. Does this not suggest emotional narcassism... not necessarily the need for multiple SEXUAL partners, but the need for singular women to love only HIM. If anything, it's a twisted form of monogamy... monogamy for the women, polygamy for the man.

Twisted, yet brilliant.

:0)

"If anything, it's a twisted form of monogamy... monogamy for the women, polygamy for the man."

Twisted it may be, and yet it is the form that polygamy has most often taken in human societies.

DON"T GET MARRIED UNLESS YOU WANT TO GIVE UP HALF YOUR SHIT!!!

He would perhaps be well advised to recognize our incapacity for objectivity. The way things are percieved to be now with gender relations is only partially a product of human nature. Our behavior is largely constructed by our social environment as well. The way we behave, present ourselves, percieve, and desire, are all formed to an extent by our specific culture. It would be difficult to make concrete statements about the difference between the ways men and women approach the idea of fidelity because of all those variables. I do find it a bit frustrating that we tend to give so much authority to our transient moral and social laws.

Do you think that there are any moral laws that aren't transient or socially constructed? How do you know the difference?

having laws that spell out in black and white terms the reason that we are so morally and socially fucked up!

I'm still really interested in the Americanness of Weiss' article. Would a French or Chilean or Chinese author make the same confessions? Have the same sense of being cheated?

I wonder if it's really morals that are out of whack. Maybe it's our culture.

Oh, and sorry, the correct link is: <link>

thanks for the correction!