Brassica napus: The Hyperaccumulator Rapeseed

I was watching an episode of the Your Mom’s House (YMH) Podcast and Tom Segura and Christina P watch a video of a… young lady… explaining how she loves that her husband has a new girlfriend and that she is enjoying the New Relationship Energy (NRE). Christina cannot relate and Tom’s face watching both women’s faces gives me NRE (Nether Region Energy). Originally, my first thought is that I’m not a fan of the term “Open Relationship”. There’s something about it that feels like getting someone else’s sweat in my mouth, but not in a fun way. Having said that, I don’t know that I can say I’ve ever sat down and had a conversation with a couple (or any number combination of partners) that have said they are in an open relationship. I’ve heard people talk about how they think about it. I’ve seen it depicted in TV and film. I’ve heard people describe someone else’s relationship by that term. As I think about it more, I can say that I have talked to people that have identified themselves as poly-amorous. I can also say that I’ve also known couples that described themselves as swingers. While I can appreciate the sentiment that I believe people are trying to express by using these terms, for some reason, I feel irked when I hear the term “Open Relationship” (or maybe even other similar terms). Maybe it’s because, to me, that means all other relationships would then be referred to as “Closed Relationships”? It seems like it wouldn’t be as “Disney Princess” to be checking boxes on forms that say “Alone” or “Closed Relationship”, so maybe that is part of it.

Even if the language used is a contributing factor, why are “romantic” or “sexual” based relationships required to only exist in the context of terms related to these very specific parameters? No one finds it necessary to describe their friendships as “Open Relationships” but aren’t all friendships technically “Open Relationships”? Wouldn’t it be weird and oppressive if we had to say, “Oh I can’t be friends with you because I already have my one and only friend”? Shouldn’t it be notable when a friend exhibits such a pervasive need to be emotionally coddled that it’s considered betrayal, or breach of contract, to experience the same type of activities or emotions with anyone else? Are we trying to say that successful interpersonal relationships are hallmarked by being submissive, clinging, or needy? Hearing someone tell me “I need you” troubles me in a way that has been condemned as cold and emotionally unavailable. In high school, a girlfriend (that I met in creative writing class) called me an “emotional robot” because she felt I had “human traits” but the “emotional pragmatism of a robot”. I admit that I felt it was a compliment but she explained that it was closer to constructive criticism so I made sure to file it in my logs under “People Things”. I do understand and empathize with the desire to be recognized and reciprocated in what a person is feeling but even if this idea of “Relationships” is based in a fear of abandonment or reluctance to be alone, aren’t many follow on behaviors to these emotions indications of some sort of disorder? And by disorder I mean just that, behaviors that are not in order with logic and are based only on immediate responses to un-evaluated emotions. It’s as if we’ve all agreed that we don’t like to feel alone or excluded so we propagate social requirements meant to trap another person into a counter-intuitive, shame based, enforceable social dynamic.

It’s as if this word “Love” is really just forcing a series of terms and practices into a labeled pipette with the soul purpose of decorating a tiered cake. Tiers based on increasing degrees of subjugation and servitude. State, Society, and Household. It feels like the enforcement of the idea of love based on loyalty to ideology over reason and organic personal inclination. Proclamations that “Two people should not look outside of their own state sanctioned household for relations” is policed through continuous evaluations by cultural and social norms. The couple should not look outside except to evaluate the legitimacy of other relationships. Households cannot look to other households or individuals for relations; however, in the role of society, other households can look inside other households when evaluating their performance. Don’t look out, look in. Report. Although Church and State are separate, the state is the only authority that can legitimize these historically religion based unions and relations. Although church and state were not separate in ancient Rome, this makes me think of the tales from Roman history about Lucretia and the Sabine Women, which were used to show how ideal Roman traits were exemplified in personal situations and resulted in political changes.

In the example of Lucretia, it begins with the description of the ideal representation (by Roman standards of the time) of family honor. A short version of the story is that a group of Roman military officers make bets on who has the wife with the most “honorable disposition”, which turns out to be a woman named Lucretia; and the result is she is raped by a prince, commits the menfolk to revenge, then commits suicide to “preserve the family honor”. A medium version of the story is, we find out that Lucretia’s display of moral disposition, even at the point of death, is taken as a challenge by Sextus Tarquinius and “her resolute modesty was overcome, as if with force, by his victorious lust”.  Sextus Tarquinius thought himself victorious because he thought that he had caused Lucretia to forfeit the ideas of honor and moral courage that he had found to be a challenge (he blackmailed her by saying he would tell everyone she had been raped by a slave); however, he was proven wrong when she called to the men of her family to report what had happened.  She went even further, after reporting what had happened, and calling upon the honor of the men to avenge what had been done, stating, “not in time to come shall ever unchaste woman live through the example of Lucretia”.   In this air quotes recounting of history air quotes, the historian Livy is saying that Lucretia showed that she was still a woman of honor (in the context and belief of what represented moral fortitude of those times). During the time of the Roman republic, there was no separation of church and state. Politics and religion were intertwined; meaning, the way in which they were performed (or wielded) was under the purview of the ruling elite.  The Roman state (or those controlling it) were enabled and empowered by the gods and the gods and practices of worship were enabled through the legitimacy ratified by those in power.  It does seem quite convenient for those at the top but it seems to me that Roman society found a comfort in leader/ follower roles based on recognized beliefs and virtues.  This self-perpetuating relationship between politics and religion was the pax deorum/pax hominum.  On a level much closer to the common people, it is easier to see how the ideas of duty and patronage would be appealing in their simplicity.  Honor your gods and your country, and you will be rewarded.  A level down from that is to honor your parents and household, and you will be rewarded.  At both levels, the idea perpetuated is that if you are neglectful of state or familial duty, you will reap negative rewards. These transitions maintain an outline that legitimize the ruling powers control over the administration of resources (to include ideas) in any form they could identify.  A description is found, in The Roman Antiquities of Dionysius of Halicarnassus, which sums up the state’s benefit of maintaining control over religion (which can be replaced with cultural/ societal ideas/ expressions):

“Observing that the means by which the whole body of citizens, the greater part of whom are hard to guide, can be induced to lead a life of moderation, to prefer justice to gain, to cultivate perseverance in hardships, and to look upon nothing as more valuable than virtue, is not oral instruction, but the habitual practice of such employments as lead to each virtue, and knowing that the great mass of men come to practice them through necessity rather than choice.”

To me, that says that the State is best served by citizens that accept the definitions of virtue (or piety) supported and propagated by the State. Looking at the distinct overlap in religion and the administration of the government of the Roman republic, it may seem as though the Roman republic operated as a theocracy.  The Encyclopedia Britannica defines theocracy as “Government by divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided.  In many theocracies, government leaders are members of the clergy, and the state's legal system is based on religious law”.  Overall, it appears that Roman religion was a flexible and expandable system, which is reflected in their overall attitude when encountering new military or technological ideas.  If there was a way to incorporate an idea that would help to maintain the status quo or consolidate power, they made a point to integrate and incentivize it.  This flexibility is also seen in the fact that, in the majority of situations, there was not a restrictive assignment to positions of the “clergy” in the sense of full-time religious officials seen practiced by today’s Abrahamic religions.  Although the men who filled the religious roles (such as Pontifex Maixmus, Priests of the gods, Augurs, etc) were most often the same men appointed to political positions, the fulfillment of either set of duties was not solely based on the religious needs of a congregation.  Although the representation of divine guidance was a force multiplier, accountability to a single set of beliefs or practices was not.  In contrast to a true theocracy, the Roman republic formed their representation of the divine around the execution of their will instead of representing their collective will as formed around the divine.  In this way, politics and religion were intertwined but without the inconvenience of religious red tape.  This ensured that the way in which either was performed (or wielded) was consistently under the purview of, and in the service to, the ruling elite.  The Roman state (or those controlling it) were enabled and empowered by their gods, and their gods and practices of worship were enabled through the legitimacy ratified by those in power.  This self-perpetuating relationship between politics and religion was the pax deorum/pax hominum consistent with Roman societies “comfort” in the leader/follower roles expressed in their pater familias based virtus.

So, I say all that about the Roman republic to ask - In the Information Age, why are we still binding ourselves to ideas that mimic these pater familias based virtus established thousands of years ago as control mechanisms? Shouldn’t we be glad to grow our circle of positive interactions and find joy in being a part of expanding interpersonal relationships? Shouldn’t we strive to be opportunity makers and not opportunity tyrants? Are we so detached from personal accountability to our own emotions that we have to attach our own identities to the emotions we feel about other people? Doesn’t this lead to ideas of ownership over the person we believe we are now physically attached to because of our psychological attachment to the emotions we experience related to them? Shouldn’t love be about the freedom to find happiness in knowing those we love are sincere in their individual expressions of happiness?