Politicians Love of Exhibitionism and Sexual Power
We may doubt the politicians love to public good. But we shouldn’t doubt their love of power, with all it presupposes: exhibitionism, attempting to escape from our condition as humble and insignificant beings, and… as evolutionary biologists and historians state, sexual power.
What does that last feature mean, exactly?
Some facts may help us to understand it: Solomon, the great ancient sage, had a harem of a thousand concubines (and one consort); Mao-Zedong, the socialist Chinese leader, opposing everything he was ideologically proclaiming, surrounded himself by a harem of some dozen concubines…
Some facts may help us to understand it: Solomon, the great ancient sage, had a harem of a thousand concubines (and one consort); Mao-Zedong, the socialist Chinese leader, opposing everything he was ideologically proclaiming, surrounded himself by a harem of some dozen concubines…
And these are not isolated cases. Whenever they could, the powerful men of the past always gathered large harems… Sexual power has been a powerful motivation to many politicians.
Naturally, we may say that democracy and new ethical values have destroyed the harems. And that’s true. But have democracy and the new values destroyed the old searching for sexual power by politicians?
If we analyse the American political scene, it seems much so. President Clinton met with political disaster after his case with Monica Lewinsky, and the same happened before him to Harry Hart. As Matt Ridley says:
Naturally, we may say that democracy and new ethical values have destroyed the harems. And that’s true. But have democracy and the new values destroyed the old searching for sexual power by politicians?
If we analyse the American political scene, it seems much so. President Clinton met with political disaster after his case with Monica Lewinsky, and the same happened before him to Harry Hart. As Matt Ridley says:
Whereas the Chinese emperor Fei-tu once kept ten thousand women in his harem, Gary Hart, running for the presidency of the most powerful nation on earth, could not even get away with two.Matt Ridley, Red Queen
Yet we shouldn’t exaggerate. Sex and politics keep mixing themselves, yet in a more moderate and hidden way. Clinton, Gary Hart or John Kennedy aren’t exactly exceptions of what goes on in political meanders. There are at least a good half a dozen American presidents with known extra-marital cases. And many thousands of unknown cases, levered by political positions, at an inferior political level.
That’s a good reason to say, as Kissinger: «Power is a great aphrodisiac».
That’s a good reason to say, as Kissinger: «Power is a great aphrodisiac».
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