sleepybones2

There’s an idea that’s been bouncing around in my head for a while which is hard to put into clear thoughts.  I apologize in advance for the fragmented presentation and less than ideal wording of things.  But I figure better to put it out there than keep it to myself.

Anyway, there seems to be this cultural idea of men becoming men by rejecting all that is female/feminine.  There’s a concept in psychology (maybe just pop-psychology or pseudo-Freudian psychology) that both boys and girls start out feeling very attached to their mothers.  Then boys start to realize they are different and they go through a crisis, where they separate their identity from that of their mother’s.

Here’s my thought on this:  That true manhood, or really, true adulthood, actually DOES depend on separation from "mother".  But I need to quickly clarify, because I don’t mean what that typically means.

I get the impression that many men (and women too, actually) are attached to the notion of "mother" as object/ideal.  We want someone to cater to us, anticipate our needs, and care for us in a totally unselfish unconditional way.  Eventually, as a boy grows the natural desire for sex gets lumped in wth all his other needs and wants.  But if the maternal attachment remains, then this gets projected (in a warped sort of way) to all women.  Sex is something women can give him, and their humanity becomes second to his need for ...