Ravage

I just finished watching the first season of True Detective on HBO. It's a great show, and if you haven't watched it yet, you should. But that aside, what I wanted to focus on in this post is a specific scene between two characters. A sex scene. I'm not going to name them so there's no spoiler (this would be a big one). But what was interesting to me was that it's one of the few sex scenes in a while which has actually moved me, both in an emotional and a "hot and bothered" way. And that's saying something...

So what was it about this scene in particular that roused me? First, it was the pent up emotion and frustration that each of the characters had. By the time we reach this scene, both of them have a lot of need and desire in their life in general, and have been in a drought in regard to both emotional and sexual needs-fulfillment. They have both been brought to a place where, despite their objectives for it, they have a tremendous need for physical connection with one another.

And when they come together, there is such blatant/raw need and energy. It is palpable through the screen. And it isn't prettied up with soft lights or a grandiose musical score, there is no nudity, and it takes under a minute. But it's intense. And it's emotional for the viewer as well as the characters.

So the question is why is it so moving?

I think the first thing is our investment/transference with the characters and their emotions. We feel them, we identify with them in some ways (even if they are our much more interesting or fucked-up selves). We want them to be satisfied. And the needs that they have mirror needs of our own.

The second reason I think this scene is so compelling is that it taps into a desire we have for extreme passion in our relationships and our sexual encounters. We live in such a strange world where men and women (especially younger ones) are encouraged to have marathon sex, where everyone is concerned with how much time on the clock went by while we were doing the nasty. We measure our sexual prowess by how many positions we can master off the Kama Sutra. We try to count the orgasms. We want to look like porn stars, so we practice the faces and the ways and means of those we watch during our quality alone time. We talk about scratching itches. But with all the focus on the act and the physical, I believe we have ironically lost all that is primal and sensual about physical intimacy. And that last word... It implies knowing; it implies emotional closeness.

David Deida in his book Way of the Superior Man talks about the idea of "ravaging" your woman. Granted, this book is supposed to be for men, but I got a lot out of reading it as well. I think the gender roles and energy can apply to females as well, so don't let that stop you from reading it if you're a woman. But back to the point, the idea of ravaging was for a man to bring his entire energy and desire to the sexual act so that this fierce passion was a transformative force for his partner.

I think that what many of us are missing is that sense of ravishment, that we are wanted and desired to that level. We are missing the fierce passion, both in ourselves and our partner. We are missing it in our emotional intimacy and our sexual intimacy.

I don't mean to suggest that it is just a one-way street in this matter either. Many men I know want to feel that level of desire from their woman, want to receive the energy of that ravishment. They want that passion to hit them like an ocean wave and engulf them. This goes beyond a woman initiating sex. It is the desire that pounces like a tigress attacking her prey.

And no matter what your sexual orientation or relationship type, most people want to feel that level of passion in their lives.

I think it strikes something primal within us, as well as giving us the level of transformative energy that can bring us to a more spiritual ("of the spirit") union as well. If nothing else, it can bring us to a more juicy and deep way of living than perhaps we are at now. And I personally would like to see more of the passionate and "real" come back into our sex lives and our expectations about what might be fulfilling.

So for myself, I need to figure out how I can get my energy and my focus in place so I can go home tonight and ravish my man.

I'm pretty sure it will be worth the effort.

Sexualization and Female Power

Power. It's a neutral thing in an of itself, like money or guns.

In cultures where social control is important, there are many warnings regarding power. We are all familiar with absolute power corrupts absolutely. There are warnings against rich men getting into heaven. When we are young, we are told not to break our arm patting ourselves on the back. We are shown the necessity for humility, but very rarely are we shown the effective uses of positive ego in regard to feelings of competence and mastery.

We are shown figures like Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr. as people who were able to stand against power with passive resistance on one hand, and on the other we are shown battle heroes like General MacArthur or Alexander the Great as people who were able to use power in active resistance or conquest.

On a rare instance we are shown women wielding power in a historical framework. Most of the time one has to dig in order to come back with names other than Joan of Arc (who became a saint, but had to get there by way of being burnt at the stake for heresy when she was 19). I'm happy to see more lists of Historical Women (http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/women/notable.htm), believe me I am. But it's our everyday woman that I really want to talk about here.

There are many cautionary tales for women also concerning power. You are warned that if you are powerful or try to become so, bad things can happen (see also, Joan of Arc, or any women in a war zone currently). Unfortunately, women through history have often been kept in place through rape, sexual servitude, marriage, and pregnancy. If you are out of the stage where these items don't apply (you're in the crone phase), you are mostly in line for other torture or death. You can be branded as a witch. You can be called a heretic.

Or, if you live in safer times, you might be afraid of power because it will make you a bitch, or "unattractive," and all of this means you will end up alone and unloved.

I often like to show this to my friends, just to remind them how not very far away we are from certain stereotypes: Women, Know Your Limits!

I use the term "sexualization" of power rather than sexuality because the latter is an organic state of being in which a woman has innate sexuality, whereas sexualization in my mind is the in-organic addition of sexuality to situations where it might not be naturally appropriate in order to make a woman's power more acceptable. My test for this is would the addition of sexuality to power in a man in any specific instance be seen as "weird" or "inappropriate" where it is not seen so when added to the behavior of women?

I often find that if I am just direct and powerful, it can be seen as me trying to be intimidating or trying to usurp power (with the assumption that it isn't mine to begin with). But many people take my use of power better if it is coupled with a softening of my words and general demeanor and if I add the element of sexuality to my bearing, I am much more well received.

One might postulate that if I am sexual, I am a known element, and also available for sex/sexual interaction, and in the end, controllable. It becomes odd though when this reaction happens in regard to the response from heterosexual woman.

Why is my power more acceptable to women if I am clearly feminine, wearing makeup and clothing that is specifically feminine, and am soft in my approach? However, I can't get too sexualized, because women will assume I am slutty and only got my power from screwing my way to the top, as it were. If I am too manly, I am accused of being butch, or trying to be a man (which is less palatable to both men and woman).

What I am getting at with this is in a modern context, I must be sexual in just the right amounts and kinds for people to not be uncomfortable with my power. And it's important for me to hit that mark, because if I don't, I run the risk of being made to "pay" for my hubris by having power either stripped from me if I am in a volatile power position, or having my power undermined by those I am interacting with, even if they don't realize that is what they are doing. The answer is just, "I felt more comfortable with the other person" and that is enough...

We can always say screw the world, I am going to be sexual and powerful in the ways I want to as organically as possible. Which I think is an excellent idea. But I also know that there are penalties if how I am does not conform to the expectations of the culture at large.

I don't want to say that men do not have lines they need to walk if they seek or have power. All I'm saying is that in a general cultural and historical context, the stakes are not as grave if they should fail.

To bring this back to the personal, I struggle with some of the fear of what will happen if I am powerful. The reminder that the world needs more powerful people who fall on the "fighting for good" side of things is one of the elements which pushes me onward.

A number of women in Hollywood feel like it's a crusade to get more women in the rank and file and in higher positions in the industry. They go about it by showing how many women are not working at the tops of the profession and having special incentives for using women on projects. However, I feel this sort of thinking is sometimes counterproductive.

Because we "firmly" believe that we are being held back/down and purposefully underrepresented, we entrench that belief in the ether. We cannot underestimate the power of belief to affect things in a thousand subtle, nuanced ways.

We also may come across to males in our field as the whiny little sister who wants to play but is being told no, instead of equal adults. Or we offend the men who are our allies and like working with us because they feel like "men" are being held as responsible for something they have little control over. And we also may not be as qualified for a job as a man in our field, but we get the job in the name of equity. And some of the men really are tired of the women who do use their sex and sexuality to get jobs they aren't qualified for in the first place. These are valid complaints that we need to recognize.

I think rather than mandates or force from the outside, the change has to be organic in us first. I think we have to feel worthy of our power and our sexuality and not afraid of it or of wielding it. I think we have to focus on our excellence and then not be afraid to show it. I think we need to stop softening ourselves if that is not the way we are intrinsically. And I think we need to stop using our sexuality in ways that legitimize or make acceptable our power.

I think it is going to take us being unafraid of what might happen if we are truly powerful. We need to come to that place internally and externally. And we DO need men to help us in building a world where we have nothing to be afraid of.

It's hard when we're fighting the proof of history and culture and politics... but I can feel the way the power in me wants to rise, and I am beginning to welcome it.