All sex is about power

[somerandomguy]

How does power imbalance become inherently exploitation?

Well, all sex is necessarily exploitive since it involves a power imbalance. There's always, always going to be someone who wants it less. If that person has sex, they become the loser. If that person rejects the other person's advances, the other person is the loser.

Possibly neither want to have sex very much and they do it anyway, in which case they both lose.

Of course, there is no scenario in which both people are winners.

 

[shimmerz]

Of course, there is no scenario in which both people are winners.

Sure there is. Don't forget, this is your story, not ours. A better wording would be 'there has been no scenario in my life in which both people are winners'.

Your thoughts don't reflect my reality at all. No disrespect there, but even the way you are assuming the whole world rolls with this belief is a huge cognitive distortion in and of itself.

 

[Ronin]

Even something as mechanic and in some ways utterly boring as card games can end in a tie.

Why be this fixated on labeling people as winner / loser? Based on what, desire levels?
Going even by your logic, I could just as well argue the person with lesser desire is the winner in that scenario, because they were not shopping that day, originally, yet walked out satisfied :) Or that rejected one, they have the more opportunities to look elsewhere, which saves them the time to try with the advances and the same person. Or, or, or.

Sighing. I saw a lot of ace people have less rigid understanding of sexuality & desire.

 

[ILoveLife]

Oh man.. ok..

Nonconsentual sex is not sex. Rape is not sex.

This is important. Rape can certainly be about power, but rape is a sexual crime, not a sexual relationship.

all sex is necessarily exploitive

All or nothing thinking.
Reframe this to: some sex can be exploitive.

always, always going to be someone who wants it less

All or nothing thinking.
Reframe this to: even if there is someone who initially wants it less, it doesn't mean that won't be the person who enjoys it more.
Happened to me a bunch of times.

I won't go into more because I'm not sure you're open to receiving differing opinions..

 

[grit]

I want to add you have a point there can be imbalance but does the imbalance permanent or bendable?

Also are you only focusing the physical aspect of it because I think a lot of men may have the physical privilege over women but not necessarily emotional or psychological, otherwise, we would not have so many with emotional issues around.

I think your initial comment about why people are pretending is the core issue?
I think it is like you said no matter how good a parent is a child will experience frustrations that will create some issues for the adult child to work through with life...same token, even though there are moments of power imbalance in sexual act, the pleasure of it is so intense, that no one cares those moments. And of course some do care and there is name for that and those experience.

but at the end is most healthy couples do not dwell on this just like most do not equate orgasm to pain too (which is proven is sort of like pain)....it is not cognition issue; it is just priority issue.
One wants to feel good and one will do whatever is necessary to get even if that includes a bit of giving up power but that does not mean power hungry or a loser, it just means one is choosing of spending mental energy on the body to enjoy the act not the political or survival of the fittest purpose!

I think your post has a meaning for you specifically that is tailored to you and your past experience and I think you are looking for validation but take both. sexual act can be power hungry or powerless depending on the moment.

 

[Friday]

I guess I just can't get around this.

For what it’s worth?

I’ve stopped thinking you’re dealing with a cognitive distortion.

I think you’re dealing with a Core Belief.

Hell, man. You swallowed “All parents are abusers” in order to protect it, whole. I’m insanely curious if you’d rationalise “All men are rapists”, to protect it, too, but that’s dirty pool.

I would encourage you to stop and think about whether or not anything that makes you reverse a long held opinion on something important to you (like abusing kids) ...without batting an eye... might not only not be serving you well, but may have it’s claws in you, in ways you don’t even see / would be surprised to find.

 

[ILoveLife]

I agree with @Friday.

Would like to add that hopefully soon your mind will be clear enough so you can come back to this with fresh eyes, reread everything we said to you and your own answers to it and maybe dispute those thoughts so you can have a better ground in reality.

My advice right now? Bookmark this thread, save it for future reference and try to stabilize your symptoms right now.

 

[littleoc]

I agree with @Friday and @Sietz

The fact that @Friday was so spot on about what‘s going on without reading your diary means that it’s definitely true

 

[Freida]

There's always, always going to be someone who wants it less. If that person has sex, they become the loser.

I agree with the others that this is a core belief that somehow got stuck in your soul. Because it is not true. I know I can't force you to see that -- but there are many, many couples who both "win" when they have sex. I've been one of them many times over the years with different partners (so I know it's not just me and hubby). It's an expression of loving another human physically as well as emotionally

It makes me sad to think that you have never experienced sex that way - as an act of love. That for you it has always been a power struggle filled with guilt and angst and anger. So you can't imagine it being any other way. And that makes sense. But it is also frustrating for you, because you are saying the sky is bright red and everyone else is saying it is blue. You want validation for your reasoning and you aren't getting it -- because your reasoning is based on very specific set of incidents that happened to you. Others have had different experiences. That doesn't lessen yours or your reasoning. It just leaves you without the agreement that I think you are hoping for.

How do you change your mind? How do you relearn what you have been raised to believe? That's the million dollar questions and what everyone here is doing -- trying to get past the cognitive distortions that keep us stuck where we are and help us find some hope that it could be better.

 

[mumstheword]

Power is a fluid dynamic thing, it's never rigid or stuck, no matter how it may feel like it is, in the moment.

Foucault has written about power and history and sexuality a lot, his books are intense, but exceedingly rich food for thought. You might want to take a look, someday.

The thing is, sexuality has been, and will probably always be, exceedingly political, no matter how much we wished it was purely personal and intimate with just one other person, so, in that light, it is about power, but there is wise, judicial, uses of power and there is abuse of power and many shades in between.

You, SRG, have bought a lot of crappy and disempowering political ideas about gender and sex, and this is a deep rooted part of your issue. It's not just you, I think all of us are affected, to some degree or another, but it colours your ideas about these things, and your thoughts on the matter need a great deal of consideration and assessment, if you are to be free of the disempowerment you currently suffer.

The idea of love as motivation, is itself, radically political and transformative, if you take a look at history and use it as context.

What, even, is love? And how is it transformative?
It's easier to talk about what it isn't. It ISN'T manipulation, it ISN'T pretension, as in not being true to how you actually feel and what you really want, in regards to one's intimate relationship(s).

It ISN'T withholding, coercing, railroading, scapegoating, being judgemental, in an overly black and white dualistic manner, and it certainly isn't being overly concerned with competing for power or punishing other's into submission. All that stuff is more narcissism and fear-based neurosis.

It's based on the idea(s) that freedom and respect are inherent, inalienable rights and are non negotionable (provided we don't hamper other's right to the same).

That truthfulness, will indeed, set us free, provided we exercise our emotional honesty with discernment and care for ourselves, our lives and the live's of our loved ones.
When we live with integrity, courage and emotional honesty, and are treated with respect and love, sex can, truly, become making love.

Sorry if this sounds preachy, but I kind of got cranky with your tone and the fact that you completely ignored me bothering to respond, as if, you are dismissing what I said, maybe cognitive dissonance?

 

[EveHarrington]

I feel kind of sad that after your abuse you continued to pick partners who had this sex “power play” thing going on.

Maybe this could be considered trauma re-creation as the abuse was about power, and I’m guessing this dynamic is at play in your current relationship.

I’m sad because you could have alternatively chosen partners who don’t use sex as power or relationship currency.

It’s a world of fcking difference between the power play dynamics and “hey we do this for fun, not as a power play”.

I hope you can talk to your therapist about this. As for changing things in an already established relationship, that may be difficult if this dynamic has been present since day one.

 

[somerandomguy]

“All men are rapists”

If we're going there, sure, why not, of course we are. I give up fighting back on this. Everyone already thinks this, the whole world already thinks this, all women think this, even all men think this about themselves, and I'm sick of fighting against it. Sure. f*ck men.

"Men are predators" is exactly what I learned growing up, anyway. I always thought I was some kind of weirdo because I didn't rape anyone. I still think that. It doesn't matter because I've been accused of it anyway and will probably be accused again, because that's what men are, even when we're not. f*cking useless to fight it.