PART THREE: APHORISMS

*

ON SEXUALITY

1. Sexuality in the post-atomic world would be - as to some extent it already is in the transitional world ... of bourgeois/proletarian civilization - free from emotional ties and consequently elevated above atomic constraints. No-one would think of affirming 'What God has joined together let no man pull asunder', for the simple reason that God, in that Creator-oriented alpha-bound sense, would have been transcended - the city having supplanted nature and considerably weakened, through its artificial constitution, man's ability or inclination to form long-lasting emotional ties. Marriage would become a thing of the past - as, to a limited extent, it already is, in practice if not always in theory!

2. Post-dualistic sexuality is both sublimated and positively unisexual, positively unisexual even when women are involved ... to the extent that, if liberated, they effectively function as Supermen, or quasi-electron equivalents, rather than strictly as women, or proton equivalents. By contrast, pre-atomic sexuality was largely concrete and negatively unisexual, to the extent that men effectively functioned as pseudo-proton equivalents - unable to equal women in sensual capacity or pleasure. With atomic sexuality, however, men entered into a more equal social relationship with women, functioning as bound-electron equivalents, the family becoming more patriarchal than matriarchal. By 'equal' I don't of course mean that they acquired a greater capacity for sensual pleasure ... so much as a distinct character as men, not yet superior to women but in no way inferior to them either.

3. The main sartorial distinction in atomic sexual relationships is between skirt and trousers - the relationships in question being dualistic and therefore properly heterosexual. No such sartorial distinction existed, however, in pre-atomic sexual relationships. For both men and women wore dresses or gowns, as befitting the predominantly negative character of pre-atomic times, the length of this feminine attire often varying according to one's status ... as either a genuine woman or an effective woman, so that, as a rule, the former wore longer dresses, tunics, or whatever than the latter. For feminine attire symbolizes the vagina, a dress or skirt forming a kind of tunnel, its length symbolizing the depth of the wearer's vagina. Men, lacking a vagina, were obviously at a sexual disadvantage to women in pre-atomic times. However, with the advent of a post-atomic age, the situation is reversed, so that trousers become the standard clothing for both men and women alike, the latter now functioning as quasi-Supermen and being at a sexual disadvantage to the former to the extent that their trousers, jeans, etc., could not intimate of or symbolize the length of the wearer's penis so convincingly or credibly as with a (genuine) man, or Superman. For trousers do, after all, refer back to the penis through their emphasis, in clinging to the outlines of a man's legs, on the phallic rather than, as with a skirt, the vaginal - a distinction, one might argue, between the cylindrical (considered as a solid) and the tubular.

4. Because women are effectively regarded as quasi-Supermen in a post-atomic age, it is fitting for them to adopt masculine attire and thus conform to the positively unisexual nature of that age. Bourgeois women, on the other hand, tend, in their open-society contexts, to wear skirts or dress rather than trousers, and usually the more bourgeois or aristocratic the woman, the longer the skirt or dress she wears. This is because such women are not ashamed to emphasize their basic femininity in conformity with heterosexual criteria. Neither, up to a point, are petty-bourgeois women, who tend to reflect a transitional development between skirts and trousers, and may as often be seen in the latter as in the former. With modern proletarian women, however, trousers, whether as cotton slacks, jeans, tights, or whatever, tend to predominate over skirts, thereby presaging an age when skirts will be entirely superseded by trousers or, at any rate, trouser-like attire ... as post-atomic criteria become more comprehensively established - a thing which is unlikely to happen much before the advent of a transcendental civilization. Even within the confines of contemporary bourgeois civilization, proletarian women display a marked preference for jeans over skirts, though when skirts are worn they are more likely to be short than long.

5. Unlike a long skirt, a short skirt, or mini, symbolizes vaginal shallowness, the tunnel it forms around the legs being relatively modest. A mini thus reduces feminine sexuality, contracts it as a preparatory step towards transcending it through the masculine attire of trousers, which, by contrast, affirm a phallic bias. As a rule, bourgeois women do not wear miniskirts, because they have no desire to contract their sexuality in conformity with quasi-unisexual criteria. The mini is really more of a petty-bourgeois than either a bourgeois or a proletarian mode of attire; for while it plays down feminine sexuality - and this contrary to superficial appearances and notions to the contrary! - it yet retains a heterosexual dimension. The proletarian quasi-Superman of tomorrow would, one imagines, consistently adopt masculine attire, unlike her contemporary counterpart who, in the West, exists within the confines of bourgeois/proletarian civilization, and is to some extent exposed to the socio-sexual influences of the ruling, i.e. bourgeois, class.

6. As to the sublimated aspect of post-atomic sexuality, there is plentiful evidence of that in contemporary Western civilization where, whether in books, magazines, videos, or films, pornography continues to flourish as an alternative to, and possible substitute for, concrete sexuality. A bourgeois will regard pornography as a mode of perversion because he tends to look upon it from a naturalistic standpoint, which, erroneously, he considers to be the only legitimate standpoint. Unbeknown to himself, however, progress must be made, and in sexual matters no less than all others! Considered from an evolutionary standpoint, pornography - and I use the term in the broadest possible erotic sense - may be seen as a means of 'spiritualizing' sex, of breaking down man's dependence on the concrete and leading him further into abstract modes of sexual indulgence. Sex 'in the head' is a higher evolutionary development than bodily sex, and it will undoubtedly be recognized as such in the post-atomic civilization, when life becomes increasingly transcendental ... as man draws nearer to his self-overcoming in the post-human life forms of the ensuing Millennium. No doubt, a certain amount of concrete sex, both literally and symbolically unisexual, will continue to prevail in that more evolved age. But it would be illogical if pornography were to be looked upon as a mode of perversion.

7. Just as, in pre-atomic unisexual times, men tended to dress in a feminine fashion and to wear their hair long, so, in the post-atomic unisexual age of the future, women will dress in a masculine fashion and wear their hair short - as, indeed, many of them do at present. When humans are close to nature at a lower stage of evolutionary development, they allow what grows naturally, as hair, nails, beard, etc., to grow long. When, however, they approximate more to the supernatural at a higher stage of evolution, they cut back what grows naturally and thus wear their hair short, keep their nails trimmed, and regularly shave. It would not become them to cultivate the natural when they are struggling towards the supernatural in increasingly artificial contexts. A bourgeois society, arising between pagan and transcendental extremes, will of course allow women to grow their hair long, and many women do in fact wear long hair in the open societies of the contemporary West. But no such concession to nature could be encouraged in a transcendental society, where, by contrast, all women would be encouraged to wear their hair short, clip their nails, etc., in conformity with post-atomic criteria. Likewise, men would be encouraged to shave off all facial hair.

8. Many people in an open society, particularly when bourgeois, would be inclined to regard what I have suggested above as an encroachment upon human liberty - in short, as an attack upon freedom. They tend to equate freedom too closely with individual interests and preferences rather than to see it in terms of spiritual progress towards the ultimate freedom (from protons and neutrons) of transcendent spirit in a supra-atomic Beyond. Thus what is in fact a reflection of enslavement, in varying degrees, to nature and the diabolic roots of life in the stars, particularly the sun, is misinterpreted by them as freedom! And some of them might even argue in favour of the 'freedom' to remain enslaved to such alpha phenomena! But evolutionary progress cannot tolerate mistaken notions of freedom or sensualist/naturalist reaction for ever! Sooner or later, such people will have to learn to respect a higher and more objective concept of freedom, such as tallies with supernatural strivings.

9. And this higher concept of freedom will indicate, quite plainly, that love, in the old emotional sense, is just one more aspect of enslavement to nature, an aspect which must be guarded against and avoided as much as possible. We see, in the present century, that such love is losing ground among people, particularly the proletariat, who are freer than earlier generations from emotional enslavement and more able, in consequence, to regularly exchange partners and experiment with various types of post-atomic sexuality. The days of the married couple are numbered, like the distinction between skirts and trousers, which appertains to a heterosexual phase of human evolution. Supermen may well live with quasi-Supermen in the future, but as free-electron equivalents vis-à-vis quasi-electron equivalents in a unisexual context of post-atomic freedom. One cannot marry a quasi-Superman, but only a woman, and, like men, women are destined to become a thing of the past, relative to a bourgeois phase of evolutionary development. This is already more than half the case now in the contemporary West. It will become wholly the case in the transcendental future!