Julius_Van_Der_Beak
Guardian of Ga'hoole
- Joined
- Jul 24, 2008
- Messages
- 17,887
- MBTI Type
- INTP
- Enneagram
- 5w6
- Instinctual Variant
- sp/so
So, let's suppose a man has a high libido and also happens to be extremely ugly so nobody will date him. He really wants sex but he can't have it. Is it ok for someone to be upset that? Why not?I think there is an enormous range of sexuality in humans and so the question of 'need' is not consistent among different individuals. Varying degrees of asexuality are completely real and legitimate. The need to not have sex is real.
For people with libido who do not have a means of expressing it, consider the feeling of being hungry when you weigh enough you could skip a meal. Imagine feeling that way all the time, but not losing any weight. It is a feeling of lack of resolution very much like being hungry without food and with the capacity to live in that state until death occurs from others causes.
You could also imagine having a chronic headache that never goes away, but is not life threatening. Is it an entitlement to take an aspirin? What if you lived with someone who was in control of the aspirin but didn't think it was important, so they withheld it continually. You never died of the headache, but they never experienced it, and felt that it's simply not necessary. Rejected persistent arousal is not a pleasant feeling - I would choose headaches over that feeling. And of course it has a social element that adds an emotional component of rejection and loss of self-worth.
Edit: If you study or observe mammals in general when the females go into heat and males respond, it isn't pleasure like having a light-hearted pizza party. It is stressful. Sexual arousal is a complex feeling and when destabilized due to environment and lack of fulfillment, it is an extreme form of anxiety. Sexual needs are not about wanting to have fun and getting mad when you can't. It goes to the core of psychology and is deeply rooted in a sense of hunger and want and deep anxieties when the process feels destabilized with rejections. This is why it triggers aggression in a lot of people.
People are absolutely entitled to reject sexuality, to not have sex. People are not entitled to be in monogamous relationships with people who have sexual needs and withhold continually. One should not force asexuality on others. If a person doesn't get headaches, they aren't in a position to say what a person who gets headaches actually needs.
Usually if anyone would express being upset about that, the word "entitled" would be thrown around. This word makes sense if sex can't be a need, and makes no sense otherwise.
Sex can't both be a need and something nobody has a right to.
(People have thought I was "entitled" even though that didn't make sense.)
I haven't been with anyone since 2018. I don't feel like I'm bothered by waiting that long.
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