If you ask me, nothing.
But others (including a lot of Catholic others) aren't on board. In response to the Elizabeth Scalia post I wrote about yesterday, Msgr. Charles Pope also defended the politician who said some stuff in younger days that now seems a little embarrassing. Having just spent some time on Pope's blog, I can tell you that there is some real gold there.
But I have my doubts about this:
He does not, however, define what he means by "a lot" and he does not advance any evidence at all for any of his three claims. And we might wonder, is there any evidence?
And note that these claims are essentially psychological not moral. I don't have any evidence either. I have an anecdote.
Years ago a girlfriend of mine told me about her favourite fantasy. She described it as a "never fail".
The fascinating thing was that it was connected with reality. Alison had been driving home from Western University with some friends and she had to stop to use a bathroom along the way. Her friends pulled up in front of a bar and she went in. It was sometime between two and three in the afternoon. Her need was such that she asked the waitress where the bathroom was and went straight there without paying too much attention to her surroundings.
She did notice that the waitress looked at her rather oddly and that the very few patrons—there were maybe three fat, bearded guys playing pool—stopped everything to watch her. What did shock her was that the place didn't have a women's washroom and the waitress showed her to the washroom she used which was behind the bar and was also used to store buckets, mops and other cleaning products.
When Alison came out, she stood a moment and watched the guys playing pool. The little area where the pool table was was formed by three walls that were paneled with cheap paneling like you used to see in basement recrooms. Around the walls were taped a number of centrefolds from porn magazines and all of these had what might best be described as "commentary" written on them. The comments were not gentle or sensitive.
The guys kept playing pool but she could tell they were checking her out and they were saying things to one another in low voices. She'd lived in dorm so she was used to crude sexist comments. She was also used to guys checking her out and saying things about her in low voices and smiling so that didn't throw her. But as she looked at the guys something about them did unnerve her a bit. She got more and more nervous the more she grasped who they were.
They were wearing jeans and leather vests and they had those truckers wallets that have the chain that runs from the wallet to the belt. It was a detail about the leather vests that was most upsetting. She told me that it was one of those cases where you know something for a few moments before you really know it. I like to think she swallowed hard when she realized she was in a biker bar but she couldn't remember anything like that. What she did remember was that she had to will herself to walk and not run towards the door.
She did run after the door closed behind her and when she got to the car her friends teased her about how pale she looked. She waited until after they were out of the parking lot before telling them it was a biker bar.
They laughed all the way back to Ottawa.
The real part of the story ends there.
She later constructed a series of fantasies about it. Although this was her "never fail" option she told me she was very careful about using it because she didn't want the fantasy to lose its power and she figured it would from overuse.
No doubt you want to know details? So did I. (Warning, there will be a test at the end.) It is kind of boring in the abstract. She liked playing with and stretching out the various mis-manœuvers that would result in her getting trapped. The longer the better. Eventually she would end up on the pool table.
The guys were always faceless. In the long slow tease before she'd end up on the pool table, she would always be scared to look in their faces and once she was on the table the light hanging over it would be in her eyes such that she could only see them from the chest down. She could hear them though and they would make comments much like what she'd seen written on the centrefolds taped to the wall.
For the rest you'll just have to use your imagination. Fantasies if this type are fairly common so you should be able to do it.
But now the questions.
But others (including a lot of Catholic others) aren't on board. In response to the Elizabeth Scalia post I wrote about yesterday, Msgr. Charles Pope also defended the politician who said some stuff in younger days that now seems a little embarrassing. Having just spent some time on Pope's blog, I can tell you that there is some real gold there.
But I have my doubts about this:
It is generally not a good idea to indulge in a lot of fantasy. When this is done the real world can seem less appealing, even disappointing. Sexual fantasizing involves imaging the perfect and ideal sexual encounter. The other person is perfect, wholly willing and when pleasure has been achieved they vanish. This is not real. In the real setting people are not perfect, do not share in identical preferences and pleasures. Real people have moods, imperfections and inadequacies as well as good qualities. Further, a spouse does not vanish after sexual intercourse. They remain there with needs, struggles, ups and downs. Real sex is with a person and happens in relationship. (Clearly this relationship should be marriage). Masturbation side-steps all this and imagines something quite unreal. To indulge this is unhealthy and can lead to unrealistic expectations.There are three factual claims in that paragraph.
- It is generally not a good idea (he later says it's "unhealthy") to indulge in a lot of fantasy.
- When this is done the real world can seem less appealing, even disappointing.
- Sexual fantasizing involves imaging the perfect and ideal sexual encounter.
He does not, however, define what he means by "a lot" and he does not advance any evidence at all for any of his three claims. And we might wonder, is there any evidence?
And note that these claims are essentially psychological not moral. I don't have any evidence either. I have an anecdote.
Years ago a girlfriend of mine told me about her favourite fantasy. She described it as a "never fail".
The fascinating thing was that it was connected with reality. Alison had been driving home from Western University with some friends and she had to stop to use a bathroom along the way. Her friends pulled up in front of a bar and she went in. It was sometime between two and three in the afternoon. Her need was such that she asked the waitress where the bathroom was and went straight there without paying too much attention to her surroundings.
She did notice that the waitress looked at her rather oddly and that the very few patrons—there were maybe three fat, bearded guys playing pool—stopped everything to watch her. What did shock her was that the place didn't have a women's washroom and the waitress showed her to the washroom she used which was behind the bar and was also used to store buckets, mops and other cleaning products.
When Alison came out, she stood a moment and watched the guys playing pool. The little area where the pool table was was formed by three walls that were paneled with cheap paneling like you used to see in basement recrooms. Around the walls were taped a number of centrefolds from porn magazines and all of these had what might best be described as "commentary" written on them. The comments were not gentle or sensitive.
The guys kept playing pool but she could tell they were checking her out and they were saying things to one another in low voices. She'd lived in dorm so she was used to crude sexist comments. She was also used to guys checking her out and saying things about her in low voices and smiling so that didn't throw her. But as she looked at the guys something about them did unnerve her a bit. She got more and more nervous the more she grasped who they were.
They were wearing jeans and leather vests and they had those truckers wallets that have the chain that runs from the wallet to the belt. It was a detail about the leather vests that was most upsetting. She told me that it was one of those cases where you know something for a few moments before you really know it. I like to think she swallowed hard when she realized she was in a biker bar but she couldn't remember anything like that. What she did remember was that she had to will herself to walk and not run towards the door.
She did run after the door closed behind her and when she got to the car her friends teased her about how pale she looked. She waited until after they were out of the parking lot before telling them it was a biker bar.
They laughed all the way back to Ottawa.
The real part of the story ends there.
She later constructed a series of fantasies about it. Although this was her "never fail" option she told me she was very careful about using it because she didn't want the fantasy to lose its power and she figured it would from overuse.
No doubt you want to know details? So did I. (Warning, there will be a test at the end.) It is kind of boring in the abstract. She liked playing with and stretching out the various mis-manœuvers that would result in her getting trapped. The longer the better. Eventually she would end up on the pool table.
The guys were always faceless. In the long slow tease before she'd end up on the pool table, she would always be scared to look in their faces and once she was on the table the light hanging over it would be in her eyes such that she could only see them from the chest down. She could hear them though and they would make comments much like what she'd seen written on the centrefolds taped to the wall.
For the rest you'll just have to use your imagination. Fantasies if this type are fairly common so you should be able to do it.
But now the questions.
- Does anything about that fantasy sound like wish fulfillment?
- I appreciated that you don't actually know Alison like I do but do you think that when she and other women—research tells us that hers is one of the most common types of female sexual fantasies— fantasize along these lines they are "imagining the perfect and ideal sexual encounter"?
- Do you think as when she walked around campus a Western after having this fantasy that she found that real world "seem less appealing, even disappointing" compared to biker bars?
I would find priests, Bishops, Cardinals issuing statments about sexuality as comical as women talking about male sexuality if it weren't for the repercussions of their statements. This is a very complex issue with few rational explanations, and once again the Church--or this Monsignor--has "stepped in it" to use the vernacular, because he doesn't know what he's talking about. Having said that, to answer your question, there is nothing wrong with sexual fantasies and, in fact, people can derive a good deal of benefit from having them. To start with, many people have sexual fantasies that they would never dream of acting on for a variety of reasons. The fantasy provides an outlet for the safe expression of whatever the predeliction happens to be for that individual. The Catholic priests that preyed upon young boys would have been better off if they had masturbated more frequently to those fantasies--yes priests do masturbate--and acted on them less. Some within the scientific community believe that the fantasy leads to acting out, others argue the opposite, and there is no consensus. The other point you raise is what constitutes "a lot." Its all realtive, and everyone is different. For the millions of people who go through life unable to find a partner, the sexual fantasy is their only outlet. Also, the anecdote about your friend is very good. The best sexual fantasies are reality based, either about an actual experience the person had, or about a person someone is familiar with but not in a sexual way, or a situation someone finds sexually arousing. The latter can be but is not necessarily wish-fulfillment. An adult man can--and many often do--fantasize about getting an over the knee bare bottom spanking by his third-grade teacher knowing full well that it will--can--never happen. Some might seek out adult women--wives, partners, online hookups, to "roleplay" that scenario, with varying degrees of success. Others would be too embarrassed to ask a woman to do that and are content to have the fantasy going solo. Sexual fantasies are about ideal sexual encounters, that's why they're so enjoyable. But it does not necessarily follow that they make the real world less appealing, nor or sexual fantasies and the "real world" mutually exclusive. Once again, the Monsignor is using Aquinian logic and rationality to explain something that is not rational or explicable in most cases, and in any case cannot be universalized. There is however some evidence to suggest that seeing the women and men in professional porn--big tits, huge dicks--make ordinary or average looking men and women less appealing, but that is another matter entirely.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, Bill Maher was on Chris Matthews last night and showed clips of Ms. O'Donnell when she was on his show several years ago. Among other things she talked about her foray into witchcraft as a high school student, but hastened to add that she did not actually join a coven! God help us!
You know, I've been thinking about this fantasy thing and that recent study about porn all day today between appointments. Something related to this came up recently on a thread on the Art of Manliness site that had to do with the popularity of Christina Hendricks. Nature intended women to be curvaceous and voluptuous, yet today's "feminine ideal" is anything but that as reported by the fashionistas. The real young women that young men today have to choose from diet and excercise obsessively in order to acheive the pencil-thin figure. Is it any wonder that men find the voluptuous women in porn more attractive than the real girl next door after she comes in from her 5 mi run? And which is more real according to nature, the fantasy woman in porn or the real woman who looks like a pubescent boy? Adds a whole new dimension to the discussion doesn't it, something the Monsignor never thought of or would ever think of.
ReplyDeleteThe same is true regarding the way men are depicted men's and men's health magazines today. For too long the "masculine ideal" has been the hairless "twink" with 6-pack abs. I see some evidence that this might be changing, but still. Some men have even gone so far as professional waxing in salons to remove the hair on their chests, back, and elsewhere, while others shave their pubic hair. So no wonder a woman would fantasize about Tom Selleck or Burt Reynolds (I know, I'm dating myself) and find the real hairless boy next door unappealing.
Some have suggested that this is all the influence of the radical feminist/left leaning intellectuals who seek to create an androgynous society. I don't know if I would go that far, but there are some with excellent credentials in the elite schools who believe that gender is a social construct that happened over thousands of years.