[Elrond]

Originally Posted by pterodactyl

Hmm. I think some things were misunderstood based upon your responses, Elrond. I will try to clear it up.

I don't think so, you have overall confirmed that what I percieved your opinions to be originally were in fact such.

I cannot see in my post where I am showing prejudice against those who like bondage and control; I can't imagine where such an opinion would lead me and I would not foster one.

"I am tired of intertwining sexuality with control. At its highest, sex is about the expression of love, intimacy and creativity; at its basest, it's a mechanism for people to get in touch with their fears and hatred through dominating or being dominated. This is gender-independent."

Saying that it’s your opinion only doesn’t take away the obvious fact that you don’t have any personal experience to back up this opinion. Also note that the poll only included the word ”control” – not bondage. ”Control” can mean many things, and certainly doesn’t have to mean ”domination” in any radical sexual-expression sense. It can just mean to be ontop of things (oops..), being in control, being a leader, etc. And you're obviously right in that regard: people that like to be in control and to be a leader are clearly getting in touch with their fears and hatred.

Perhaps this is something you have inferred, in which case you should re-examine your own perceptions. I can openly state that I don't carry such prejudice; anyone who wishes to engage in this kind of behavior is free to do so in my mind.

Of course. There is a lot of ways that I condone where people can get in touch with their fears and hatred.

So let us clear that up now. I do not have experience with this, nor do I feel the need to comment extensively on it, except to say that I feel that, in general, oppressing others or dominating others is an expression of fear and powerlessness on the part of the oppressor. Again, *my opinion* is that this is the case but I am happy to look for factual cases to support it if that is what's needed; I doubt it is necessary to do so.

Lol, I don’t have any scientific studies on it, but here is a site where men and women alike are very happy with being in a male-led relationship:

(Reader beware: some of the articles on this site may contain explicit content)

Taken In Hand

To address your second point, my issue is with the appropriateness of Deida's model of sexuality. Of course, his definitions may not fit me, but they also do not apply to many other people. The value of a model lies in its ability to accurately reflect real data. In the case of Deida's hypothesis on sexuality and sexual chemistry, we have no or limited information on its appropriateness, yet he has filled an entire book with extrapolations that many people seem to believe. It would be interesting to see whether there are couples who have actually been helped by his theories; for example look at relationships which were salvaged or improved by Deida's book and evaluate how appropriate his ideas really are. I think there are much better and more highly validated models to employ when thinking about attractiveness, mate selection and sexual choice of partner rather than individuals responding to this mystical "masculine and feminine core essence."

As to your last point, I think you are missing my point. To clarify, my point was that Deida's work appears outwardly progressive and open-minded, but ultimately boils down to the same old, same old.

Nope. Didn’t miss you point. That’s exactly what you said in your last post. And I still fail to see how there seems to be a problem with his message being the ”same old, same old”. In fact, the ”same old, same old” is more likely to be true for a greater part of the populace than any other theory on masculine/feminine, and I daresay also your theory of the absence of masculine/feminine (or that they are sexual polarities). You should also know that even if people act and do certain things in a relationship does not mean that it is how they would like to act or how they would like their relationships to be. They might have a liking, knowing or unknowingly, towards controlling/not controlling. But who counteracts this?

Society. Society, at least the society that I am a part of, has a big thing for romantic relationships being equal, and for one part to be more in control than the other is fundamentally unequal. You can in fact find a good amount of testimonials from people that wanted a certain relationship, but they felt guilty about their desires because of what society had taught them. You can also find testimonials of people that were raging old-school feminists and literally being appelled by having a relationship that resembles the dynamic proposed here as far as sexual attraction is concerned, and then finding out that they actually prefer that dynamic. Both on that site that I mentioned.