Thanks for pointing this out--for foucault, amongst others, "power"
and "violence," and maybe even "force," are very different animals.
Even if one does wish to say that "sex" is not about "violence,"
that's not the same at all from saying that "desire" is not about
"power."
///connor
> Date: Sat, 6 Jul 1996 11:18:27 -0400 (EDT)
> From: malgosia askanas <ma@xxxxxxxxx>
> To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: Re: Rape
> Reply-to: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Jeff wrote:
>
> > Well, I, for one, am not always violent when I am engaged in sex, and I
> > take it most people are not (but then, I have always been niave about these
> > sorts of things). I do not become sexually aroused everytime I see a
> > violent scence in a movie. I do know of studeios which "show" that men
> > exposed to violent matieral are more likely to be violent when engaged in
> > sex later, but I am not aware of any which discuss the relationship between
> > violence and excitement. Perhaps I need more facts. In any case, I have
> > no qualms with asserting on a normative basis that sex ought not be about
> > violence- nothing should be about violence.
>
> This seems to me an overly breezy treatment. I would argue that there _is_
> in sex always a certain element of violence -- although there is the obvious
> problem of what it is useful to call "violence". Let me make my argument
> in terms of "power" to avoid this problem. In sex I want something from
> another person, and/or another person wants something from me. We attempt
> to seduce and arouse each other. We can each deny to the other what the other
> person wants, postpone it, prolong it, try to change its terms, try to resist
> the other persons postponements/prolongations/changes. We get aroused by
> seeing the other person aroused. We are dependent upon one another and
> have to work with this dependence (except in rape, one of whose aspects seems to
> be a violent negation of this dependence). Doesn't all this have to do
> with power?
>
>
> -m
>
_________________________________________________________
E.M. Connor Durflinger Philosopher for Hire
"Have Forestructures, Will Travel"
Reverend, Universal Life Church
bc05319@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx PIC Program at B.U.
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