The Blue Monkey Review

Alpha blogger...hah..John, you're too kind. I'm shooting for Ur though. One of these lives.

New school year! Welcome back, Spock. I've missed your Blue Monkey.
Neha's post *IS* very interesting. Other than the preference for traditional Indian dress, I think one would find men's attitudes are similar these days regardless of geography and cultural background. While in the U.S. we certainly have a visible (if somewhat fictional) "hook-up" culture, men rarely marry or even maintain relationships with women they sleep with so soon after meeting (I think I remember a survey in like Time magazine from a few years ago that less than 10% of the married couples in their survey had their first sexual encounter, either as marrieds or before marriage, within a month of their initial meeting, but I can't get my hands on the data so you have to trust me that I haven't made this up. THe other 90% or so were two months and beyond with the largest grouping in the 3-6 month range). Also, in the U.S., most men do not expect their wives to be virgins before they get married, they certainly are not going to marry a whore (which these days is defined as a woman who has had at least half as many sexual partners as you have). At least in Asia where virginity is expected, the women are not walking a tight-rope of a marriable amount of sexual experience in anticipation of THE RIGHT MAN to come along.

Ah yes, the right man or woman. We're all waiting for him or her, or, if married, wondering if we might have missed something in the applications we read. It does seem simpler to let the parents decide.

Jennifer, thanks for keeping a cyber-eye open for Blue Monkey. My course, Sex in America, is using it this semester.

I noticed your students' discussions of liberal sex. It makes me wish I hadn't taken this semester off from my school I had Marriage and Sexuality on the docket this quarter, taught of course by a celibate priest:-)

Nice observation JA. Back home you're supposed to fall in love after you get married. It's more important to settle down and plan babies first....everything else is pretty much secondary. The right person is whoever the parents have chosen - I should talk about my neighbour in CT sometime. In a nutshell, she got married at 24, left a high profile job, relocated to America to be with her husband who wont let her breathe without begging for his permission. I could take off on a tangent on individuality right here, but I guess that's a tantrum for another time.

where the right person i concerned is beyond, i know of female partners accusing the male partner of rape, in an arranged marriage, but enevr having done anything about it because of social pressure.

is that a right person? the couple have stuck it out and have celebrated their 25th Anniversary, but was it worth it? was it a right? they now don't have any issues, but i know for a fact they have lived troubled lives. the truth is that when a woman in India goes through with an arranged marriage its more due to social pressure,s and therefore is less likely to talk out when such sexual demands are made. when such is the case, it is an assumed role that men have a right.

Another piece of trivia of where men are concerned, in an Indian background, in the year 2001-2002, 3,000 cases of domestic abuse were reported with the male spouse raping the female, not a single person was convicted, as it was given that men had that right in the home life.

most of these women would either have a highly supportive social support system with whose help they owuld have walked out or even filed a complaint against the man, however, in most social viewpoints in India, she would be shunned and most likely be outcast in a not obvious manner, unless she had the support of her family.