The past year has been a very tough one for me. Work has slowed to a below subsistence pace and despite putting dozens of resumes out a week there have been no responses. About a month or so ago I decided to start using the down time this winter to write. This was partly inspired by a diary I read on DK regarding a new product called Liquid Trust which, according to the diary, causes one to experience feelings of trust and generosity, and according to those pushing it, even love.
This prompted me to suggest that it should be marketed in a stealth manner on FOX News, telling all the Republican men it would make their penises bigger. Those who took the bait would then be overwhelmed by feelings of trust, generosity and love, and would thereafter likely stop being self-centered, greedy little right wing pricks.
Then I had this idea ...
Background
I've been what one might call a hardcore advocate for partnership oriented relationships and societal order, as opposed to the traditional hierarchical paternal authoritarianism we've almost all been conditioned to accept since birth. My views on this have been heavily influenced by Dr. Riane Eisler and her book, Sacred Pleasure, and also by Dr. Robert Altemeyer and his book, The Authoritarians.
Briefly, authoritarianism has three highly correlated attitudes and/or behaviors ...
1. Authoritarian submission — a high degree of submissiveness to the authorities who are perceived to be established and legitimate in the society in which one lives.
2. Authoritarian aggression — a general aggressiveness directed against deviants, outgroups, and other people that are perceived to be targets according to established authorities.
3. Conventionalism — a high degree of adherence to the traditions and social norms that are perceived to be endorsed by society and its established authorities, and a belief that others in one's society should also be required to adhere to these norms[3].
Add to this the idea that men should dominate women and that in general the strong should dominate the weak, the rich dominate the poor, those of fair-skinned western European descent should dominate everyone else and generally the darker your skin the more screwed you are ... and that is pretty much how our society is organized. It is drummed into us from the time we're able to distinguish the blue or pink nightclothes we're given.
In Sacred Pleasure, Dr. Eisler presents some of the same material that was in her previous book, The Chalice and the Blade, but presents it from the perspective of the history of our cultural attitudes towards pleasure and sexuality. Essentially she argues that early agrarian societies were organized around the cyclic celebrations of the seasons and viewed sexuality and physical pleasure with open joy and acceptance. They also were based on cooperative partnership between the sexes where each was viewed on an equal basis. She claims that the traditional concept of cavemen brutally dominating their women does not square with the drawings and artifacts that remain from that period.
When the old religions began being overtaken by the new paternal authoritarian religions, one of the biggest targets was pleasure. They called anything that brought pleasurable sensations to the body sinful. This was part of the cultural clash behind the European witch hunts - the demonization, literally, of anyone who still celebrated the pleasure-based rites of the earth-mother religions. And while we stopped burning witches long ago, (mostly), many of the same attitudes against sexual pleasure, and especially against female sexual pleasure, still prevail. They are largely perpetuated through religion and through social/cultural traditions and practices.
And even in today's popular culture where women are highly sexualized and the pressures are enormous to be thin and pretty, it is all about being appealing to men and giving men pleasure. Meanwhile a great many of those men are cluelessly selfish, or just plain selfish, and never consider their partner's experience as being important independent of their own. As long as he gets off - which he eventually will providing he can keep it up and isn't too drugged or drunk - that is all that matters. Sadly, modern American men expect our women to be pretty, sexy and to sexually please us, but don't feel particularly obliged to return the favor, or never learned how because we never realized there was anything much to learn.
Having rejected these attitudes a couple of decades ago ago I have invested a great deal of time and effort into learning about women's sexuality, and what makes the difference in terms of her being able to achieve orgasm. And in this effort I have mostly read and listened to women, and been a very open and receptive learner with my lovers. I've also trained myself physically in various ways that enhance my lovemaking. These are all things I know well, know how I know them, and can explain to others.
And another thing I've learned to do quite well over the past few years is write effective personals ads for dating on Craigslist. In fact, despite being from a fairly small population center, my last several ads have only needed to run a few hours before I deleted them. In that time I had already gotten enough real responses to be able to meet someone with whom there was a mutual interest and make plans for a date. This is far from the norm for guys posting on CL looking for women.
My Idea
I know that I can teach men how to find lovers on Craigslist, and I can promise them results if they truly follow my advise. This involves no trickery, no system to learn, nothing that is in any way dishonorable or inappropriate. Instead it involves accepting, honoring, and celebrating women's birthright to experience sexual satisfaction. It involves really accepting women's sexual equality. Acknowledging that a lady answering his ad is no more "a slut" than he is for placing it. And further, getting him to recognize that the source of that degrading language is the sexually oppressive authoritarianism that likely lurks in his conditioning.
By clearing those attitudes from his thoughts it makes him more likely to treat all of the women in his life with more respect and caring - behaviors which in turn make it more likely that potential partners will like him and be receptive to his seduction. And BTW - when I say seduction, from my site:
And let me point out that I use the word seduction in a very positive way. I don't mean it in some tawdry sense of trying to weasel a girl into sex when she really doesn't want you or want to have sex. I mean it in the sense of attracting a lady who might like to have sex with "the right guy"; convincing her that you are "the right guy" - at least for now; getting her excited about the prospect of you touching her; and touching her in ways that make her even more excited at the prospect of you having sex with her. This is what I mean when I say seduction.
And having established in his mind the importance of being a decent lover I provide a basic primer on what he needs to know to co-create an evening of lovemaking - the whats, whens, wheres, hows, and how much's - to give him a grounding and confidence that he knows what to do ... at least better than most men ever bother to learn, while also stressing the "co" part.
And this knowledge and confidence will both also serve him in the process of seduction and romance. And that is another key - encouraging him to treat his partners in a romantic way despite not being in a relationship. Many men make the mistake of thinking that romance is purely for expressing their love for a woman. But as I say in my book, creating a sense of romance goes a long way towards getting a lady's mind and body geared for erotic pleasures. It can also greatly help to intensify her overall experience.
So essentially I am using my knowledge of how to craft ads and how to orchestrate the process of seduction from emails through to date night as bait. And then, when guys take the bait, using that as an opportunity to strike out against authoritarianism. And if I can get some guys whose mindset was, "How can I get laid on Craigslist?", and transform them into men who treat women respectfully and are skillful and considerate lovers, then I think the overall "humanity quotient" of the planet goes up just a little. Instead of bait-and-switch it is bait-and-transform.
I've often speculated that there might be a similar intent behind Dr. Eisler's authorship of Sacred Pleasure. Like perhaps her idea of focusing on the pleasure part of the equation was to draw in male readership to expose them to her broader ideas. And then again, perhaps I saw it in that way because that's how it worked on me :)
So anyway, I've written a guide titled, Finding a Lover on Craigslist (& How to Keep Her Coming Back for More)and started up a website to promote and sell the book. If anyone has the time and interest and would care to visit the site I would greatly appreciate feedback, criticisms, ideas, whatever comes up for you.
I'm also hoping to be able to find an agent who might be interested in representing this book. If anyone has any possible contacts I might try that would be wonderful as well. I understand that erotica is selling well right now so perhaps there is a market for this as well.
Final Note
As some of you may have already noted, I've put the link for my site in my sig line. For the past couple of years I've had Dr. Bob's link there and over that time gotten maybe a dozen references to it in comments - all positive. Having had this new link there for a week I've already had two people comment on it, using it for ad hominem attacks against me in comment threads in which we were disagreeing. I find this interesting and guess it is something I'll need to deal with from time to time.
Over the years I've seen many people have links for books, videos, bumper stickers, CDs, and other commercial items in their sig lines. (And for my own product, I don't expect to get much if any business from folks here at DKos. But having the link put out on the web does help with ranking in certain search engines and makes my blog-time at least be somewhat productive towards paying my bills.) And yet, despite this long history here of people promoting various items, I had one commenter call me out as a shill and claimed I was propagandizing against a bill that I actually support, simply because I am promoting my book in my sig line. He didn't bother to explain why I would bother arguing with him in a day-old and otherwise dead diary if my purpose for commenting was to shill for my book.
Another rather prickly commenter told me that my book was pathetic. Not that she'd read it, apparently the title was enough for her to proclaim it, and me by association, to be pathetic. But then, I guess there are also a lot of authoritarian women out there too. By my not conforming to traditional roles and relationships she deems me to be pathetic and and worthy of her public ridicule. (See numbers 2 and 3 in the authoritarian characteristics list.) So it goes.
Thanks for your time! KB