Word of the day: protean

For today’s word, boys and girls, let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to start. Protean is derived from the greek protos, which means “first” (this also is how the word protein is derived; proteins were first posited as a theoretical basis of all life). The Greeks also used this to form the name of Proteus, one of Poseidon’s right-hand men back in the days. Proteus had the ability to change shape to avoid capture, which has led to the common English meaning today:

protean

1. Exhibiting considerable variety or diversity
2. Readily assuming different forms or characters; extremely variable

I find the etymology of protein to be very interesting, since so much of their function derives from their topological mutability. But I digress. The phrase that captured my attention this morning was “voluptuously protean”, which I think is just a lovely turn of the tongue. I found it in an article about sex in today’s permissive and open society. What really struck me though was how the article ended up:

There is another factor, though. I think the process of sexual permissiveness, the adoption of sex as a supposedly harmless game, has been vastly intensified by the internet in recent years.

The internet introduces us to the sexual thoughts of others, and the sexual variety and fervency of the human subconscious, in a wholly new way. When it comes to sex, the net is voluptuously protean. If you want to find images of naked Russian girls in mud baths, there they are on the net. Whatever you want, whatever you think it possible to conceive of is on the net. And because it is there it somehow seems, well, more licit, more understandable, more mainstream.

This versatile nature of the net is especially dangerous, because it can reveal to anyone the multifarious kinks in their own brain.

It is good that people feel less inhibited about sex. But sex isn’t just about orgasms. It ain’t just about fun. For all their faults, our forefathers knew something about sex that we seem to have forgotten.

Sex is not a computer game. It is not a party trick. It is not tennis with bells on. The sexual urge comes from the most primitive and aggressive parts of the human brain. It is certainly not something you should mix carelessly with disinhibitors such as drink and drugs.

Put it another way. Sex can drive us to states of bliss, but it also has a cruel and savage aspect. And when we take it too far then sex can destroy lives.

This stirs right into thoughts that have been swirling around in my own head, both as an man rapidly approaching middle-age, dealing with living in an age inherited by kids (who just won’t keep off my damn lawn!), and as a father of a kid growing up in a world where the ills of both Bush’s abstinence dogma, and the pervasive use of sex as a marketing tool, ripen and fester.

How does one deal with a world bent on repressing and demonizing something that is essentially a private matter? One the one hand you want to open the doors and turn on the lights to cast out the demons the right-wing prudes conjure up, to free society of the lodestones that sexual oppression hands us, but on the other hand you want to save from having sex lose its intimacy and intensely personal meaning via every media outlet trying to capture our attention. In practice, finding one’s own balance isn’t too difficult I suppose, it is part of growing up, but it does seem like our society as a whole needs to take a class in sex education. And not just in the physical aspects of it (pregnancy, disease, etc), but in the emotional aspects as well, so that our collective conscious can find a sense of propriety somewhere between taboo and the banal.

Sex and society; a protean dilemma indeed.

-c