the state of sex & love
WHAT DO WE want when we want to have sex? More starkly: what are we hoping for when we imagine happiness looks like having as much sex as possible?
James K. A. Smith • On the Road with Saint Augustine: A Real-World Spirituality for Restless Hearts
We seek intimacy to protect ourselves from feeling alone; and yet creating the distance essential to eroticism means stepping back from the comfort of our partner and feeling more alone.
Esther Perel • Mating in Captivity
Sexual continence—chastity—outside of celibacy looks like a relationship to sex that doesn’t idolize it, doesn’t let it define us, doesn’t let it become a hunger that eats us alive. In other words, the gift of chastity is that it trains us not to need; it grants us an integrity and independence and agency in the face of various drives and hungers.
James K. A. Smith • On the Road with Saint Augustine: A Real-World Spirituality for Restless Hearts
"Marriage was an economic institution in which you were given a partnership for life in terms of children and social status and succession and companionship. But now we want our partner to still give us all these things, but in addition I want you to be my best friend and my trusted confidant and my passionate lover to boot, and we live twice as... See more
Aziz Ansari • Modern Romance
“It’s not singlehood, dear friend, that hurts; it’s not casual sex, the fluidity of our bonds, nor their ephemeral nature that causes pain.” Rather, it’s the way that power operates in relationships. Desire isn’t a spontaneous, apolitical passion; it’s shaped by the world around us, and by what we’ve been taught to value. Romance operates like a... See more
Hannah Giorgis • Why Does Romance Now Feel Like Work?
Joyless is the operative word, one that links bimbos and tradwives in their pursuit of pleasure, no matter how much reality it requires you to ignore, or how much oppression, disrespect, and dehumanization it requires you to endure. Feminism becomes a scapegoat for capitalism’s ills, while marriage starts to look like a safe haven. But that... See more