12 Comments
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Rosa Maria's avatar

Many confuse erotism with pornography. One is a symphony, the other is a piano thrown from a tenth storey.

The Ascent's avatar

Nice analogy.

Rosa Maria's avatar

Thank you. I tried to come up with the greatest difference between them.

Movies Meets History's avatar

I like how both this and your last essay indirectly fight against the commodification and commercialization of the female body, but approach it through the lens of seeking connection with God and a higher sense of self-purpose. There’s so much written on the former subject where the conclusion is “because capitalism sucks” or “because misogyny sucks,” but they end with cynicism and lack a call to something higher.

The Ascent's avatar

Thank you! One goal is to show the positive spiritual realities and not simply the critiques.

CHINASAOKWU CHIBUIKEM NELSON's avatar

👏🏼

Jayden Shelton's avatar

Thank you for your work, brother. The fragmented world we are in needs revelations like this. God be with you.

The Ascent's avatar

Thank you!

Valmonde Di Greco's avatar

Sharp diagnosis of online porn, but the solution retreats into a fragile, neo-Puritanical asceticism. Eros is a raw, physical drive engineered for genetic propagation, dominance, and legacy. Pleonexia shouldn't be pathologized as a spiritual defect that needs to be pacified into existential rest. For high-agency men, restlessness is the fuel source for excellence. Framing ambition and lust as sins is slave morality rebranded.

The Ascent's avatar

Pleonexia was considered a negative amongst classical Greeks, as witnessed by the Platonic dialogues, like the Gorgias. It is an insatiable desire for more unbridled by reason. There is a good "love of gain," as Plato tries to make clear in the Hipparchus, and this is seen in man's erotic appetites for pleasure, nobility, and truth - but they have to be governed by virtue. No one would accuse Plato of being a puritan, except maybe Callicles.

BigJamesTheTruth's avatar

What gay man wrote this for attention

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May 27
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