Monday, August 11, 2008

What is a utopia? Why do we seek it?


After a lengthy hiatus from this blog I felt motivated to post something today. Perhaps more out of consideration for those of you that have done me the past kindness of reading what I have written rather than from inspiration. During my absence I have done considerable thinking and once again I am in what lifestyle people would term a “vanilla” relationship. While not perfect, it does in many ways meet the basic needs of the human experience and I find satisfaction and contentment within it.

Perhaps my desire and search for a dominant female partner interested in pursuing a female led relationship was a bit too utopian. The roots of the word “Utopia” in the ancient Greek actually mean “no place” or “a place that does not exist.” And yet, it is a timeless, relevant human desire to find such a place. Sir Thomas Moore conceptualized “Utopia” as the name for an ideal society, in his book written in 1516 describing a fictional island in the Atlantic Ocean, possessing a seemingly perfect socio-politico-legal system. “Utopia” is sometimes used pejoratively, in reference to an unrealistic ideal that is impossible to achieve.

After much thought and research, I have come to conclude that my expectations at least for this day and time are simply not realistic. There is too much evolutionary conditioning to overcome on the part of both sexes. Society continues to raise male offspring to be dominant and female offspring to be submissive. Even those women who possess natural dominance I think succumb to the perpetuation of the species “prime directive” I have written about previously and are inextricably drawn to strong, dominant, take-charge men rather than sensitive, submissive types. Even among the more enlightened females, I think submission continues to be equated with weakness even if on an unconscious level.

Matriarchal society may at some point in the future develop and thrive, but I have come to seriously doubt I will experience that in my lifetime. Better I have decided to suppress the submissive side of my nature and knuckle under to the expectations of society and be the “normal” assertive, dominant partner in a relationship than to long for an unrealistic ideal.