cheating, honorable people, and reality
Catherine and I were having lunch with Loretta Cormier the other day, talking about, among other things, faithfulness. Her late husband was a man of utter integrity. She mentioned that most of the people in their circle of friends were faithful spouses as well. Catherine and I were both reared by parents who were faithful. And most of our parents' friends are too.
At Catherine's office, though, she is the only person who knows such good men: every one of the four ladies she works with lives in a world filled with men who cheat. Brothers, uncles, husbands, fathers, sons, boyfriends. Every one of them. Ask about it, and they'll say that's just men for you. Later, we had dinner with Mom and Dad, who reminisced about his old workplace when they were first married, a place where he was the only man — the only one — who didn't cheat on his wife.
All this got me to thinking: the Huaorani could be forgiven for thinking all the world's a jungle, just as the Bedouin for thinking it's a desert.
Our American sense of individualism makes much of the contrarian on a craggy rock, the Randian hero standing alone among mediocre sell-outs. But that flies in the face of observable reality. Most of the time, we operate not as individuals but as communities. We tend to replicate the patterns we see around us. If your parents had a happy marriage and were utterly faithful, and if you had a wide circle of friends who were all the same way (and chances are you did), then you're much more likely to be that way yourself. If your parents had an unhappy marriage, or were unfaithful, and if you had a wide circle of friends who were all the same way (and chances are you did), then you're much more likely to be that way.
Granted, we're all grownups, responsible for how we act. After you're twenty-five or so you can no longer lay it all on your environment: you are the person you decide to be. Nonetheless, our communities have a way of handing us scripts, and we have a way of taking them whether we really want them or not. To override that script, or write your own, is a rare achievement. (In the same conversation with my parents, we had a good laugh about the ways in which they're tied to the gender roles of their generation. I now recall that Mom did the baking for that meal and Dad did the grilling.)
So it's not unusual that people from different demimondes would think of each other as naïve. Usually, though, it runs in only one direction: those who've been wronged by every man they've ever known would say that women like Catherine just don't know what the world is like. But Catherine could say the same thing, and it might even be truer, for after all Catherine is well aware of men who are dishonorable; but anyone who thinks all men are doesn't have the whole picture.
Why is suburbia always pictured as unreal, while city life is real? Why is a virgin depicted as someone who just doesn't know about the opposite sex? (I know far more than many men about what lengths a woman will go to for sex. I was reminded of this in the Comal River the other day, when I hadn't realized how strong the current was until I tried to stand still.) In what strange world do the Bedouin always think of the Huaorani as fools, but the Huaorani never think that of the Bedouin?
I shall consult Second Law of Thermodynamics, and Genesis 3.
At Catherine's office, though, she is the only person who knows such good men: every one of the four ladies she works with lives in a world filled with men who cheat. Brothers, uncles, husbands, fathers, sons, boyfriends. Every one of them. Ask about it, and they'll say that's just men for you. Later, we had dinner with Mom and Dad, who reminisced about his old workplace when they were first married, a place where he was the only man — the only one — who didn't cheat on his wife.
All this got me to thinking: the Huaorani could be forgiven for thinking all the world's a jungle, just as the Bedouin for thinking it's a desert.
Our American sense of individualism makes much of the contrarian on a craggy rock, the Randian hero standing alone among mediocre sell-outs. But that flies in the face of observable reality. Most of the time, we operate not as individuals but as communities. We tend to replicate the patterns we see around us. If your parents had a happy marriage and were utterly faithful, and if you had a wide circle of friends who were all the same way (and chances are you did), then you're much more likely to be that way yourself. If your parents had an unhappy marriage, or were unfaithful, and if you had a wide circle of friends who were all the same way (and chances are you did), then you're much more likely to be that way.
Granted, we're all grownups, responsible for how we act. After you're twenty-five or so you can no longer lay it all on your environment: you are the person you decide to be. Nonetheless, our communities have a way of handing us scripts, and we have a way of taking them whether we really want them or not. To override that script, or write your own, is a rare achievement. (In the same conversation with my parents, we had a good laugh about the ways in which they're tied to the gender roles of their generation. I now recall that Mom did the baking for that meal and Dad did the grilling.)
So it's not unusual that people from different demimondes would think of each other as naïve. Usually, though, it runs in only one direction: those who've been wronged by every man they've ever known would say that women like Catherine just don't know what the world is like. But Catherine could say the same thing, and it might even be truer, for after all Catherine is well aware of men who are dishonorable; but anyone who thinks all men are doesn't have the whole picture.
Why is suburbia always pictured as unreal, while city life is real? Why is a virgin depicted as someone who just doesn't know about the opposite sex? (I know far more than many men about what lengths a woman will go to for sex. I was reminded of this in the Comal River the other day, when I hadn't realized how strong the current was until I tried to stand still.) In what strange world do the Bedouin always think of the Huaorani as fools, but the Huaorani never think that of the Bedouin?
I shall consult Second Law of Thermodynamics, and Genesis 3.
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