An Explanation of Courtly Love

Dalrock

More Androsphere Memes Showing up at FM

Has there been a change in writers over the blog? (I had always been aware that it was a group blog, given the divergent political perspectives that have appeared in concurrent articles in the past, but such androsphere-friendly articles are relatively new.)

Taylor Swift shows us love in the 21st century

What's an appropriate tag, "red pill truths"?

Related:
Rod Dreher, OTOH, hasn't really changed in his perspective on women: Modern ‘Love’ in the Age of Tinder

Who Can Blame Him?

Post by SOOMPI.com.

The danger of a "reality" show focusing on a play-marriage. Concupiscence in the name of romance...

The Wisdom of Bill Kauffman

Love Is the Answer to Empire
Reclaiming citizenship means rescuing the color and vitality of home from the march of imperial gray.

see also Patriotism in Little Louisville, Kentucky by Katherine Dalton.

Do We Have the Character to Make this Happen?

Iowa Couple Married 72 Years Dies Holding Hands, an Hour Apart

Fr. Hugh Barbour on Homosexuality and SSM

Chronicles: Do Homosexuals Exist? Or, Where Do We Go From Here? by Fr. Hugh Barbour

The Alpha and His Harem

HanCinema: "Jang Ok-jeong" Kim Tae-hee becomes a royal concubine

Does this part of the fantasy appeal to Korean women, becoming the concubine of high-status, wealthy man, who is not exclusive? Or do they watch it more for the downfall of certain characters? (Apparently this version of Jang Hui-bin's story is more positive, possibly even revisionistic or just plain historical fiction.)

There would be overt protests from Uhmericans to the romanticizing of a actual or soft harem (their private beliefs might be different).





장옥정

In Defense of Matchmaking

Matchmaking and Imagined Sentiments: Jane Austen's Emma by Mitchell Kalpakgian

What do matchmakers know that eludes the common man? What does the common man know that escapes the matchmakers? Austen’s novel shows that true romance originates from equality of social background and education, compatibility of temperaments, similarity of moral ideals and manners, natural attraction based on reason and feeling, and mutual admiration. Matchmaking ignores these facts and truths on which good marriages are founded, exaggerating the role of the feelings and ignoring the importance of the mind, moral character, and the virtue of prudence in marital choices. Matchmaking imagines sentiments that do not exist and does not let love follow its natural course in which like is attracted to like.

Is Emma an argument against matchmaking? Or are her attempts marked by her lack of wisdom and lofty, perhaps even romantic expectations? The problem is not matchmaking, but the one doing it (and her principles of judgment). Could it even be said that Emma is fortunate to be saved from herself by an older, wiser man? I don't think that would be an exaggeration. The equality of education that is needed is not in book-learning (though it may be important for some men), but in moral formation and culture. In  the androsphere it is said that the current situation is the result of women being left to their fallen nature and their own judgment about what is best for them. They might actually benefit from the services of a matchmaker, an older person situated in a social network, if they had the humility to admit that their judgment may not be that good. They'd also need the beginnings of a good character which would aid in governing or diminishing their more wild or base impulses.

Austen: Not Your Generic Romance Novel?

Austen’s Pride and Prejudice by Mitchell Kalpakgian

The sad reality of male-female attraction.

Athol Kay relays a message from a reader:

[M]y teenage daughter had a slumber party recently, and my wife (who is unaware of Game concepts) overheard the girls talking about the boys in their school. What struck me about the conversation that she relayed to me was that the girls were categorizing the boys into two groups: “Hot & Mean” and “Not-hot & Nice.” There couldn’t be a better example of the Alpha/Beta theory, as interpreted by 13 year old girls.

Vox comments on some blogger's confessional.

Hypergamy

An explanation offered by a reader of VFR:

Hypergamy means that women are attracted to men who are "above" them--superior to themselves and, ideally, to other men as well. This can be either social dominance, in the form of wealth or social status, or personal dominance, in the form of physical strength or force of personality. The social dominance of men over women, being a function of traditional patriarchy, has been negated by female empowerment. With women more or less equal to men in socioeconomic terms, only those few men who are of much richer or higher status than the common run of men are perceived by women as socially dominant.

This leaves personal dominance as the weightier factor influencing the modern woman's choice in men. As for physical strength, modern man has little opportunity to display his superiority in this area outside of sports. Not long ago, even the lowliest manual laborer could establish and reestablish his virility daily by performing tasks beyond the ability of most any woman, and thus partially offset the disadvantage incurred by his lower social status relative to other men. Mechanization has largely neutralized this male advantage as well. The other venue in which brute physical strength was displayed was fighting, which was once tolerated if not outright encouraged but is now so severely sanctioned (at least for white men) that the only ones who can afford to engage in it are those with nothing left to lose. Once upon a time, even good men were occasionally violent. Nowadays only bad men are violent. If violence is outlawed, only outlaws will be violent.


Which brings us to the final point. The only way that an increasing number of men can distinguish themselves is by resorting to the one type of dominance remaining to them: dominant personality. This covers a wide range of qualities: leadership, decisiveness, confidence, determination, independence, resourcefulness, risk-taking, charisma, intelligence, wit, etc. What needs to be noted about all these is that, while they initially appear to be unreservedly positive qualities, they are in fact morally neutral (as are all the other forms of dominance mentioned above--a physically strong man is not necessarily good, nor a rich man, nor a high-status man, despite the fact that we would all prefer to be strong, rich and powerful). A personally dominant, "manly" man may be either good or bad. We could just as easily re-word the above list as: domineering, impulsive, arrogant, pig-headed, selfish, inconsiderate, irresponsible, reckless, devious, and yes, violent. Whether we choose positive or negative terms to describe them, these are the "alpha" traits that women subconsciously associate with high-status men. Of course, the "alpha" qualities they crave are really epiphenomenal, merely superficial markers of the things they really need, not the things themselves. Thus, to a woman judging men in the raw, unmediated by any societal evaluation, a man who puts on a convincing act of being confident and charismatic is as good as a man who is confident and charismatic and has the accomplishments to prove it. And when this act is accompanied by the brute physical violence forbidden to men who play by the rules, the combined effect is intoxicating. Women are attracted at the visceral level to the raw masculinity, which they in turn interpret at the conscious level in the most hopeful light possible, taking wishful thinking to heights unimaginable to us men. A temple built atop a sewer indeed. "But to the girdle do the gods inherit, beneath is all the fiend's." There is thus no contradiction in a woman imagining herself to be seeking safety from a "strong" man who excites her and ends up abusing her.


Patriarchy valorizes qualities that men value in other men, dominant or not, "beta" qualities such as loyalty, honesty and industriousness, and converts these into a currency that women value: social status and the financial resources that accompany it. In this way male and female values become aligned. In the past, women's judgments of men were mediated by male authority. Nowadays, however, women are evaluating men on the basis of their own subjective, gut-level feelings, which, while accurate indicators of the thrills they can expect from the relationship, are poor indicators of their prospects for long-term happiness.

More at another blog.

See also: Deeper questions and Roissy tells Murray to "man up".

We need a traditional/conservative alternative.

"Lefty" websites for eco-awareness, sustainability, and relocalization like Yes! Magazine are useful but the editors don't see how articles like this work against community, rather than build it. This was published in Dec. 2010, but it was featured on FB today, ostensibly on the occasion of Valentine's Day.

Sex Without Jealousy, Love Without Ownership
Exploring open relationships can change our assumptions about intimacy and empowerment.
by Jen Angel

Witness the intellectual confusion that results from the deliberate severing of the procreative function from sex, and ignorance of the justification for such emotions as jealousy. Jealousy is not necessarily tied to a wrong notion of ownership, but it can be interpreted in that way.



Edward Feser, The Metaphysics of Romantic Love
Shannon Hayes: Finding Love, Is it Different for Radical Homemakers?
Conplementarian Loners: What is Happiness?
Athol Kay has a new book.

Michael Novak Discusses Romantic Love

The Myth of Romantic Love

No doubt it was occasioned by V-Day. Some, in particular the recently "singled," on FB use the same day to "observe" Singles Awareness Day.

We can't talk about love without referring to Denis de Rougemonet's Love in the Western World. (Still haven't finished reading it.) Eros might be analyzed into certain chemicals involved in passions consequent upon the senses (or maybe even chemical signalling like pheromones), but it cannot help but be pulled towards something higher -- the desire for permanence, friendship/communion?

Is "love" given to different psychological/physiological, behavioral, moral reactions to desire? Most Catholic writers avoid saying eros is immoral. They may talk about how it is a natural response that nonetheless needs to be elevated or subsumed into charity. The moral imperative is to integrate the natural desire to pair off and procreate with reason.

What are the steps of "falling in love" and "being in love"? Does the release of one hormone lead to the release of another? Dopamine is released when we are in the presence of the other to whom we are attracted, we converse with her or act with her. It is not necessarily grounded upon a judgment of deep compatability -- it may simply result from the natural dynamic between men and women, the pleasure one has when one is in the company of a member of the opposite sex, in the initial excitement of attraction. One is no longer alone in the way Adam was alone, and pleasure results from the attaining of a certain good, companionship with a member of the other sex. The basis of marital communion is the natural dynamic between men and women. (Granted, this sort of loneliness will not be satisfied by having friends of the same sex, since what is lacking is not just a friend but a friend of the opposite sex--this loneliness is determined in a peculiar way by the instinct to pair off. So heartbreak may not be taken away through the company of friends, but the sadness of heartbreak can be eased through consolation and distraction.) People will often talk about chemistry, which is a rather vague notion since it covers a variety of things -- affinity, emotional and physiological reactions, and so on. This reinforces that initial pleasure.

But what causes the initial attraction? Is it merely the sex drive and testosterone? The object of attraction must first be recognized, and there are many influences other than instinct (e.g. being attracted to someone with certain physical features because they signal health, fertility, strength, masculinity, etc.) on our idealization of a lover.

I suppose the point of this post is simply to hash these thoughts out, and to think about how the senses (and the body) operate in conjunction with reason with respect to "romantic love."

Athol Kay Explains the Physiology of "Love"

Athol Kay: In Love Feelings, Pair Bonded Love... And Me So Horny

Zenit: Benedict XVI's Q and A With Catholic Action Youth [2010-10-31]
"The Strength of God's Love Can Accomplish Great Things in You"

Young woman's question: Your Holiness, our teachers in Catholic Action tell us that to grow up it is necessary to learn to love, but often we fail and we suffer in our relationships, in our friendships, in our first loves. But what does it mean to love totally? How can we learn to love truly?

Benedict XVI: A great question. It is very important, I would say fundamental, to learn to love, truly to love, to learn the art of real love! In adolescence we stop before the mirror and we notice that we are changing. But if you continue to look at yourself, you will never grow up! You grow up when you do no longer let the mirror be the only truth about you but when you let your friends tell you. You will grow up if you are able to make your life a gift to others, not to seek yourselves, but to give yourselves to others: this is the school of love. This love, however, must bring you into that "more" that today shout to everyone. "There is more!" As I have already said, I too, in my youth wanted something more than what the society and the mentality of the time presented to me. I wanted to breathe pure air, above all I desired a beautiful and good world, like our God, the Father of Jesus, wanted for everyone. And I understood more and more that the world becomes beautiful and good if one knows this will of God and if the world corresponds to this will of God, which is the true light, beauty, love that gives the world meaning.

It is quite true: You cannot and must not adapt yourselves to a love reduced to a commodity to be consumed without respect for oneself or for others, incapable of chastity and purity. This is not freedom. Much of the "love" that is proposed by the media, on the internet, is not love but egoism, closure, it gives you the illusion of a moment, but it does not make you happy, it does not make you grow up, it binds you like a chain that suffocates more beautiful thoughts and sentiments, the true desires of the heart, that irrepressible power that is love and that has its maximum expression in Jesus and strength and fire in the Holy Spirit, who enflames your lives, your thoughts, your affections. Of course it demands sacrifice to live love in the true way -- without renunciation one does not find this road -- but I am certain that you are not afraid of the toil of a challenging and authentic love. It is the only kind that, in the final analysis, gives true joy! There is a test that tells you whether your love is growing in a healthy way: If you do not exclude others from your life, above all your friends who are suffering and alone, people in difficulty, and if you open your heart to the great friend Jesus.

Catholic Action also teaches you the roads to take to learn authentic love: participation in the life of the Church, of your Christian community, loving your friends in the Children's Catholic Action group, in Catholic Action, availability to those of your age at school, in the parish or in other environments, the company of the Mother of Jesus, Mary, who knows how to guide your heart and lead you along the way of good. Moreover, in Catholic Action, you have many examples of genuine, beautiful, true love: Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati, Blessed Alberto Marvelli; love that also leads to the sacrifice of one's life, like with Blessed Pierina Morosini and Blessed Antonia Mesina.

Young people of Catholic Action, aspire to big goals, because God gives you the strength. "More" is being young people and children who decide to love like Jesus does, to be the protagonists of our own lives, protagonists in the Church, witnesses of the faith to those who are your age. "More" is the human and Christian formation that you experience in Catholic Action, which unites spiritual life, fraternity, public witness to the faith, ecclesial communion, love for the Church, collaboration with the bishops and priests, spiritual friendship. "Growing up together" speaks of the importance of being part of a group and a community that helps you to grow, to discover your vocation and to learn true love. Thank you.

Azione Cattolica Italiana

Life After RC thinks that the Dietrich Von Hildebrand Legacy Project should distance itself from the IPS and thus, the Legionaries: Deeply. Troubling.


Related links:
The Nature of Love, by Dietrich von Hildebrand.