Many of the "puritans" and protestants of the new world were just as guilty. Blackbeard attacked Charleston not for money, but for medicine...to treat syphilis. The fact that they knew a supply would be there tells you a lot for the demand at the time.
All the founding fathers of the US wore wigs. Franklin, arguably Quaker, was most notorious for his debauchery. Jefferson fathered children out of wedlock.
This mythical moral standards did not and has never existed.
Many of you seem to think I'm advocating all our hedonism, which is the exact opposite of what I'm saying. What I am saying is: moral standards are not enough to keep this in cheque and legal safeguards need to be in place for any hope.
All the founding fathers of the US wore wigs. Franklin, arguably Quaker, was most notorious for his debauchery. Jefferson fathered children out of wedlock.
This mythical moral standards did not and has never existed.
You just corroborated his point. Regals had the opportunity to engage in more debauchery than commoners -- the rules for thee, not for me dictum. Most commoners could not afford to engage in such trifles due to the difficulty in surviving at the time -- the social contracts held well for the commoners, opposite of how it is today where everyone is actively being encouraged from the top-down -- the zeitgeist -- to abandon shame, embrace pride, and act degenerate.
None of those are "royalty" of any sort, and in fact all despised the concept. Teach/blackbeard, nor his crew, definitely weren't and you conveniently ignore that fact. Also why was their so much medicine in Charleston for it if no one needed it?
As for Victorian era Britain, mothers were selling their teenage daughters into prostitution:
Teach/blackbeard, nor his crew, definitely weren't and you conveniently ignore that fact. Also why was their so much medicine in Charleston for it if no one needed it?
No one said no one needed it. You're engaging in the false dilemma -- we're talking about majority commoners. Were there people who did need it because they did mess around? Of course. But was it widespread and encouraged throughout the community of plebeians? Of course not. Since it wasn't like sex was promoted as a shameless pastime like it has been in modern times since the burgeoning of the sexual revolution.
As for Victorian era Britain, mothers were selling their teenage daughters into prostitution:
Those are rare cases that are present in any society where poor people do whatever is available to them to survive.
And just before then, the marquis de Sade wrote the literal book on sadism and sexual deviancy.
Yes, and he was forthright quite renown for his sadism and even jailed for it. It was not as if he was not brought before the court of public scrutiny for his debauchery, because he was -- it was not a commonplace occurrence among the populace.
The point remains. Some cultures and some people are more sexually virtuous than others.
De Sade was (at the time) and has always been held up as a extreme pervert. He died alone and penniless on the run from a death sentence. What he did was not embraced at the time, whereas BDSM is a cute hobby now. A woman could walk a man on a leash downtown in a major American city and do no more than raise a few eyebrows.
Law is downstream from morality and culture. I agree that there should be legal change. Bring back At Fault Divorce!
But a good start would be for men to start noticing that women with high body-counts are terrible wives. Next would be to notice that university graduates almost always have high body counts.
Bring back marriage as a contract between a man and a women before God.
From there we can move towards public parades of adulterers; both sexes for all I care.
But your idea that it was all the same debauchery forever? I don't agree. I just think that rich bastards always had more opportunity to do what they wanted, even if it was against the moral consensus of the day. To quote a certain movie: "It is good to be the king!"
Those were the aristocracy. French royal courts etc, which were famous for their degeneracy.
The Puritan movement and, later, Victorian sensibilities were a response to that degenerate bullshit.
I remind you that the British Empire reached its height in the Victorian age.
Want to point to the orgies of the late Roman empire and declare that everyone, everywhere has orgies?
Some great posts in this thread
Not at all.
Many of the "puritans" and protestants of the new world were just as guilty. Blackbeard attacked Charleston not for money, but for medicine...to treat syphilis. The fact that they knew a supply would be there tells you a lot for the demand at the time.
All the founding fathers of the US wore wigs. Franklin, arguably Quaker, was most notorious for his debauchery. Jefferson fathered children out of wedlock.
This mythical moral standards did not and has never existed.
Many of you seem to think I'm advocating all our hedonism, which is the exact opposite of what I'm saying. What I am saying is: moral standards are not enough to keep this in cheque and legal safeguards need to be in place for any hope.
You just corroborated his point. Regals had the opportunity to engage in more debauchery than commoners -- the rules for thee, not for me dictum. Most commoners could not afford to engage in such trifles due to the difficulty in surviving at the time -- the social contracts held well for the commoners, opposite of how it is today where everyone is actively being encouraged from the top-down -- the zeitgeist -- to abandon shame, embrace pride, and act degenerate.
None of those are "royalty" of any sort, and in fact all despised the concept. Teach/blackbeard, nor his crew, definitely weren't and you conveniently ignore that fact. Also why was their so much medicine in Charleston for it if no one needed it?
As for Victorian era Britain, mothers were selling their teenage daughters into prostitution:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Maiden_Tribute_of_Modern_Babylon
And just before then, the marquis de Sade wrote the literal book on sadism and sexual deviancy.
Feminism traces it's roots to then as well.
This was not the era of morality you all believe in.
No one said no one needed it. You're engaging in the false dilemma -- we're talking about majority commoners. Were there people who did need it because they did mess around? Of course. But was it widespread and encouraged throughout the community of plebeians? Of course not. Since it wasn't like sex was promoted as a shameless pastime like it has been in modern times since the burgeoning of the sexual revolution.
This has been going on since the dawn of civilisation: https://www.cairn.info/revue-d-assyriologie-2017-1-page-9.htm
Those are rare cases that are present in any society where poor people do whatever is available to them to survive.
Yes, and he was forthright quite renown for his sadism and even jailed for it. It was not as if he was not brought before the court of public scrutiny for his debauchery, because he was -- it was not a commonplace occurrence among the populace.
The point remains. Some cultures and some people are more sexually virtuous than others.
De Sade was (at the time) and has always been held up as a extreme pervert. He died alone and penniless on the run from a death sentence. What he did was not embraced at the time, whereas BDSM is a cute hobby now. A woman could walk a man on a leash downtown in a major American city and do no more than raise a few eyebrows.
Law is downstream from morality and culture. I agree that there should be legal change. Bring back At Fault Divorce!
But a good start would be for men to start noticing that women with high body-counts are terrible wives. Next would be to notice that university graduates almost always have high body counts.
Bring back marriage as a contract between a man and a women before God.
From there we can move towards public parades of adulterers; both sexes for all I care.
But your idea that it was all the same debauchery forever? I don't agree. I just think that rich bastards always had more opportunity to do what they wanted, even if it was against the moral consensus of the day. To quote a certain movie: "It is good to be the king!"