Corrupted Humours by Donald Friedman

Author:Donald Friedman [Friedman, Donald]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: -
ISBN: 9781098323431
Publisher: BOOKBABY
Published: 2020-08-27T22:00:00+00:00

The Chatelaine, A novel by Owen Berk

Chapter 10

The thing is not to get crazed and take it personally, Snaedeker said. He was leafing through the photos and the detective report. You know—get judgmental. Masochism is no more a moral issue than a gall bladder attack. That’s not to say I don’t understand the need for discretion. I’ll use an innocuous diagnosis out of the DSM for the insurance carrier and the details will remain right here. You understand, this is not a first time event. Your wife has probably been on an inexorable, addictive course, unable to arrest her own slide.

I’d like to see you this understanding with your wife playing decorative centerpiece for five strangers.

Until now I bet you didn’t think there was anything wrong with her masochism.

What the hell is that supposed to mean?

I mean that she, like many women—maybe most women—was accepted and rewarded for exhibiting passivity and dependence. Indeed, I bet I could demonstrate that your model of a healthy female—more emotional, submissive, dependent, subjective and so ontracks the current, adaptationist description of the masochist.

And that would be?

That masochism is a defense against perceived threat; that the masochist uses passive dependent behavior to preserve self—as a weaker animal rolls over and submits in selfprotection—and that that is a socially conditioned response.

I see. My wife is licking strange genitals and being walked on a leash because we have a patriarchal society.

I know you’re upset—

Now that’s what I call psychological insight.

Please, Bill, stop pacing. Sit in the chair, and put the letter opener down—you look deranged. Let me explain this differently. Masochism, especially sexual masochism, is a multiply-determined phenomenon and there are many ways to look at it. The most innocuous and currently fashionable view is that it’s just a kind of stress reliever.

Being walked naked on all fours is an alternative to jogging and yoga?

You know the expression “rich people’s problems”?

I do, and I can’t wait to hear this one.

It’s a fact that masochists are pretty much only found in the ranks of the privileged, the best educated, the most successful. They are the strivers, the achievers, the ones whose psyches need a break from all that. You two are responsible, high status, highly visible members of your community. You are people who are in control of your lives and who work hard to stay in control—or to maintain the illusion of control if we want to get philosophical about it. Your days are spent in decision-making. This kind of behavior is not sought out by the poor, underachieving, or disenfranchised.

The wish to be bound, spanked, commanded, displayed naked before others who are clothed, to be humbled—yes, even to wear a collar and be lead like a dog, may be no more or less than relief from the load of adult responsibility, the responsibility of self-hood. It’s pretty obvious that in taking orders she is giving up the burden of control. Through the voluntary humiliation that seems to be distressing you the most she abandons the effort to be perpetually enhancing her self-esteem.

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