J.D. Unwin's 'Sex & Culture' - A quick overview - before we get juicy......

This is very insightful and well researched book by an Oxford social anthropologist called J.D. Unwin.

Unwin’s describes this works as a 600 page summary, saying that seven volumes would be required to lay it all out in exact detail.
After reading it myself, I can only stand in awe at the conscientiousness that he applied to his research.

A post earlier today mentioning my total lack of consciousnesses! lol
https://blurtlatam.intinte.org/blurtfunny/@lucylin/4shmrw-starting-from-tomorrow-the-game-of-ethics-where-everyone-has-a-voice-and-nothing-is-free-whether-you-like-it-or-not

He was non religious.

Unwin examines detailed data from 86 societies and civilizations, not to to see if there is a relationship between sexual freedom and the flourishing of cultures, but simply to write 'what is' to the best of his ability, and draw conclusions from the data.
I.e -He did not set out to prove an hypothesis.

The fact this book was written nearly a hundred years ago - in 1934, so pre 'the sexual revolutions' of the 60 only adds weight to the conclusions he draws.

He describe four “great patterns of human culture” and the degrees of flourishing in each culture, measured in terms of 'religous practices', sexual practices, architecture, art, engineering, agriculture etc.

THE FOUR PATTERNS:

Zoistic societies: An entirely self-focused society, with no concepts or celebrations of 'the dead'. These cultures had no interest in understanding nature, it;s cycles, or any investigative motivations.
He described as a 'dead culture' or 'inert'.

Monistic societies : These cultures have some superstitious beliefs and do reserve some special treatment of the dead, and in doing so, attempt to rationalize the world in some way.

Deistic societies : These cultures see, and attribute, the power of the natural world to either a god - or gods.
This is required for 'organized religions', to begin to form.

Rationalistic societies : The use rational thinking to understand natures secrets, and to live life based on this perspective.

Alongside these four different categories, he also classified sexual practices within each of these four societies.

'Degrees of sexual restraint' were divided into prenuptial and post nuptial.

The prenuptial categories are:

Complete sexual freedom - no restraints at all in the form of cultural exceptions or judgments.

Irregular or occasional restraint - Cultural regulations.
(This would require an occasional periods of sexual abstinence).

Strict Chastity - To be a virgin until married

Post nuptial categories are:

***Modified Monogamy**** - This means one spouse at a time, but with freedom to break this association (by either party).

Modified Polygamy - Where men can have more than one wife, but a wife is free to leave her husband.

Absolute Monogamy - Only one spouse permitted for a lifetime.

Absolute Polygamy - Men can have more than one wife, but wives must confine their sexual activity to their husbands only, for the whole of their lives.”

So....... what results did he find, and what conclusions did he draw from this decades long research?

?

Some main points:

(this is a complete injustice to the depth and rigor of this man's work)

An increased sexual constraint (pre nuptial OR post-nuptial) ALWAYS led to an increasing - and flourishing - of the culture.
And with an increased sexual freedom ?
This ALWAYS led to the collapse of a culture - And always taking place within three generations from the time the sexual freedom was increased.

The single (most important) correlation with a flourishing of a culture was whether or not pre-nuptial chastity was required.

The most powerful combination in terms of a flourishing culture, was with pre-nuptial chastity, coupled with 'absolute monogamy'.

When a strict prenuptial chastity culture was no longer the norm, then absolute monogamy (post nuptial) deism (organized religions), and rational thinking also disappeared - All within three generations.

If total sexual freedom was ever embraced by a culture, then that culture collapsed within three generations.

What Unwin describes as 'inert' cultures, is characterized as a people or culture who have little interest anything other than their own wants and needs (hedonism).

He noticed when this societal collapse occurred, the 'inert' culture was usually conquered by another culture - one with 'greater social energy'.
'Social energy' has two categories - one of these being 'expansive'.

When there is a change in the cultural sexual constraints, (increased or decreased), then the full effect of that shift is not realized until the third generation after the change.
Unwin’s 'generation' is approximately 33 years - so about a century to see any sexual cultural changes take full effect.

His data shows that this 'having your cake and eating it too' (all the benefits of a rationalistic society and sexual freedom) lasts only one generation before the cultural decline sets in.

Unwin wrote:

The history of these societies consists of a series of monotonous repetitions; and it is difficult to decide which aspect of the story is the more significant: the lamentable lack of original thought which in each case the reformers displayed, or the amazing alacrity with which, after a period of intense compulsory continence (sexual restraint), the human organism seizes the earliest opportunity to satisfy its innate desires in a direct or perverted manner. Sometimes a man has been heard to declare that he wishes both to enjoy the advantages of high culture and to abolish compulsory continence. The inherent nature of the human organism, however, seems to be such that these desires are incompatible, even contradictory. The reformer may be likened to the foolish boy who desires both to keep his cake and to consume it. Any human society is free to choose either to display great energy or to enjoy sexual freedom; the evidence is that it cannot do both for more than one generation.

The old adage of 'correlation does not entail causation', was also addressed by J.D Unwin.
He makes it very clear that he does not know why , exactly , sexual freedom directly leads to the decline and collapse of culture.
(he does hypothesize that when the sexual energy is restrained (celibacy or monogamy) it is then diverted into more productive social energies, which seems a very logical conclusion.

Stored energy - sexual or otherwise - has to go somewhere.

If this sexual energy has no way to be expressed out into the world, (other than sex itself) , then it may also go some way to explain the explosion in depression and other forms of mental illness, over this last 50 years....

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