Followup to Stuck in the middle with Bruce:
Bruce is a description of masochistic personality disorder. Bruce's dysfunctional behavior may or may not be related to sexual masochism [safe for work], which is demonized by most people in America. Yet there are ordinary, socially-accepted behaviors that seem partly masochistic to me:
- Eating spicy food
- Listening to the music of Anton Webern or Alban Berg (not trying to be funny; this is very serious)
- Listening to music turned up so loud that it hurts
- Fiction
- Movies, especially horror movies
- Roller coasters
- Saunas
- Enjoying exercise
- Being Bruce
Question 1: Can you list more?
Question 2: Doubtless some of the behaviors I listed have completely different explanations, some of which might not involve masochism at all. Which do you think involve enjoying pain? Can you cluster them by causal mechanism?
Question 3: When we find ourselves acting masochistically, should we try to "correct" it? Or is it part of a healthy human's nature? If so, what's the evolutionary-psych explanation? (I was surprised not to find any evo-psych explanations for masochism on the web; or even any general theory of masochism that tried to unite two different behaviors. All I found were the ideas that sexual masochism is caused by bad childhood models of love, and that masochistic personality is caused by other, unspecified bad experiences. No suggestion that masochism is part of our normal pleasure mechanism.)
Some hypotheses:
- Evolution implemented "need to explore" (in the "exploration/exploitation" sense) as pleasure in new experiences, and adaptation to any particular often-repeated stimulus. This could result in seeking ever-higher levels of stimulation, even above the pain threshold. (This could affect a culture as well as an organism, giving the progression Vivaldi -> Bach -> Mozart -> Beethoven -> Wagner -> Stravinsky -> Berg -> screw it, let's invent rock and roll and start over. My original belief was that this progression was caused by people trying to signal sophistication, rather than by honest enjoyment of music. But maybe some people <DELETION of "jaded"> honestly enjoy Berg.)
- We have a "pain thermostat" to get us to explore / prevent us from being too cowardly, and modern life leaves us below our set point. (Is masochism more prevalent now than in the bad old days?)
- An objection to this is that sometimes, when people are in emotional pain, they work through it by throwing themselves into further emotional pain (e.g., by listening to Pink Floyd).
- An objection to this objection is that primal scream therapy seems not actually to work except in the short term.
- An objection to this is that sometimes, when people are in emotional pain, they work through it by throwing themselves into further emotional pain (e.g., by listening to Pink Floyd).
- Pain triggers endorphins in order to help us fight or flee, and it feels good.
- We enjoy fighting and athletic competition, and pain is associated with these things we enjoy.
My guess is that, if it's a side-effect (e.g., 3) or a non-causal association (4), it's okay to eliminate masochism. Otherwise, that could be risky.
These all lead up to Question 4, which is a fun-theory question: Would purging ourselves of masochism make life less fun?
ADDED: Question 5: Can we train ourselves not to be Bruce without damaging our enjoyment of these other things?
:::::::::: Many people do think of BDSM as a sexual perversion. I didn't invent this reality; I just live here. ::::::::::
This answer strikes me as a bit facile. Sure, lots of people think of BDSM as a sexual perversion. Lots of people also consider it a sexual preference. You chose to use words that stigmatize BDSM, and you chose not to present words that don't stigmatize BDSM. You could have made the same point without using stigmatizing words. Stating that you have no opinion after the fact is an attempt to dodge responsibility for that.
The way we frame these things matters. I wouldn't have such a problem with what you said if you had at least noted the judgment inherent in the terms you used -- but you didn't. For instance, if you really have no negative judgments around BDSM, then you might have said something like: "Many people think of masochism as a sexual perversion, while others see it as a harmless sexual preference."
:::::::::: That's probably more sympathetic to your view than anything you'll find in mainstream media, or even in psychology journals. ::::::::::
Like those of people, the opinions presented in mainstream media and psychology journals vary. As it happens, I will be speaking at a psychology conference in May that's specifically intended to train psychology professionals in being more sensitive to BDSM-identified patients. (The conference will take place at Chicago's Center on Halsted.)
And again, by claiming that you've been more sympathetic to my opinions than "other" forms of media, you're trying to dodge responsibility for the fact that you presented a plainly judgmental viewpoint.
:::::::::: If that means that you resent discussion of the idea, this website isn't right for you. We discuss things that make us uncomfortable, because we want to know the answer. ::::::::::
Discuss the idea all you want. Just know, while you're "examining", that there are real people who have real masochistic needs whom you may really be stigmatizing with what you say. And the idea that you must "examine" this need in itself can be stigmatizing.
Perhaps I can illustrate this with an example: Would you even consider "examining" why gay people are gay? Why straight people are straight? I don't know this site very well. Maybe you would discuss those questions. But if you wouldn't, then perhaps it might be worth asking yourself why you think it's worth examining masochism and wondering what "causes" it, when you don't ask similar questions about straightness or LGBTQ or what have you.
For more on this, I recommend this post: [ http://sm-feminist.blogspot.com/2009/03/examination-burnout.html ]
:::::::::: Could you post some links to specific pages discussing theories? ::::::::::
I can try; I don't have a lot of time to hunt down specific posts, but I've read a lot on this topic and I might be able to come up with something. It would be helpful if you could ask a more specific question, though.
It's probably obvious that my personal favorite BDSM theory blog is SM-Feminist: [ http://sm-feminist.blogspot.com/ ]
But I don't think she has much truck with evol-psych, either, though I could be wrong.
If you jump into discussions of BDSM with moral accusations, and threaten people with social rejection unless they discuss it the way you want them to, you discourage people from talking about it at all. That's not to your advantage.
Thanks for the links - I'll look into them. I appreciate your sharing your knowledge.