Musing

The thing some people don't know is, sado-masochism is mainstream. It's just that it's more of the emotional/psychological kind... Which is, of course, a thousand times more healthy than physical expressions of it. After all, you can't see this kind of sado-masochism, so it's not really there. You don't even need the "Safe, Sane and Consensual" credo... since it's not there and all... (:-|)

The thing that makes me curious is, why do people have this love affair, be it with their own pain or others'? Why do people become convinced that suffering and sacrifice is more noble than joy and freedom? What's the absolute root of it, if there is one?

Thinking back to early childhood, I don't think it's just human nature, because I do not recall this fascination in myself, not until years later, when I looked to the pain of others as confirmation that I wasn't alone. Is it, then, cultural? Are there, then, cultures that do not have this fixation? (I've only ever lived in America, my time outside of it adds up to two weeks out of 26 years, so I'm not familiar enough with other places to be able to answer that myself.) Is it that, in these times when survival is comparatively easy, the pain we and others experience satisfies something that these lives do not otherwise fulfill in us? Is it some huge game of pretend, since so many ways we react to things are more taught to us than instinctive--learned fear, learned hatred, learned guilt--without which our humanity supposedly comes into question? Is it a power game, in which we are taught emotional and psychological pain as a means of control, in a world where informed and freely-given cooperation is just too much work and not a guarantee anyway? I think much of it is.

How, then, do we heal this moth-to-the-flame self-destructivness that is so much a part of this culture and others, that has been made a part of many of us ourselves? Can there be healing such that it would overtake "the heartache, and the thousand... shocks that flesh is heir to"? The old saying goes that healing cannot be acchieved by a person unless they recognize that they need it, unless they truly want it. How can we make people aware of it? How can people not be aware of it?

Imagine what this world might be like. Imagine a world where people can be honest with one another, because everyone is secure and mature enough to handle it. Imagine a world where its glorious variety is universally recognized and appreciated for the spice that it is. Imagine a world where it's recognized that respect for oneself and respect for others does not have to be opposed to one another--and shouldn't be.

That... that is a consummation devoutly to be wished.