My life's work is about...
The Cosmic Love Story-
The Eternal Mate
Formerly...
The Tonti Conection
By: A La Lansun

As far back as May 1, 1985 the problem began to focus when Dennis Wholey, host of a Latenight America telecast (WTVS, Detroit, Michigan)  interviewed Ms. Pat Collins, Arts and Entertainment Editor then for CBS Morning News. The subject was violence and sex, and the connection between media programming that featured physical abuse of women in sexual scenes and the steadily increasing violence toward women.
    Examples used at the time included the results of an experiment performed at the University of Wisconsin in which college-age men were exposed to a stready diet of films and videos where women were raped and/or murdered in graphically violent ways. At the conclusion of the prescribed exposure period, a mock rape trial was held, with these same men acting as the jury.
   Without exception, every one of them sided with the rapist and against the victim. In addition, during the question and answer period that folowed, the same young men flatly stated that if they had the opportunity they, too, would rape.
   The men were then put through a debriefing, during which time they did not view any "slasher" films. After the debriefing period, the same mock rape trial was conducted, with exactly the same evidence presented. This time they sided with the victim and against the rapist. In other words, when the stimulus of this type of material was removed, their attitude and their decision were completely reversed.
   Nor is the negative attitude toward women confined to single men in the college age group. Psychiatrists report that an alarming number of their women patients tell them that after their husbands watch films in which there is bondage, whipping, or other forms of destructive behavior aimed at women, the men want their wives to reenact such scenes with them.  At first the wives accede to their huband's requests for the sake of the marriage, but as the scenes become more intense and physically abusive, they are forced to refuse. By the time these women finally seek professional help, the marriages are totally shot and the women have sustained considerable emotional damage.
   By connecting sex and violence the way such material does the message is also conveyed that sex and violence go together, are interchangeable. For example, when sexually explicit films were shown during the research period, the men became sexually aroused only when violence toward women was introduced.
   What did this research tell us way back then?  It should have rung a loud alarm, and based on today's statistics It must sound an even louder alarm today. Have women been conditioned to accept, even expect, such treatment by centuries of nonrestance and devaluation of our worth?  That we still feel obliged to tolerate a relationship with someone who uses us or violates us, emotionally and/or physically? Are we still so ignorant of our own nature and self-worth that we can be shoved in the wrong direction?
   So much is spouted today, even out of the mouths of twelve- and thirteen-year olds, about great sex.  But who is talkkng about great love?  These two facets of human experience seem to have been surgically separated.  It is hard to listen to the wistfulness in the voices of many young women who use the past tense when they speak of a belief in a great love relationship. 
   Well, maybe our minds can buy this, but our hearts cannot.  It's time to remember a basic law --people create and sustain what they give their attention to; what they support, actively or passively. So when the physical side of human nature is constantly reinforced and projected, we should not be surprised if a relationship never develops empathy or intimacy in other areas.
   The frightening thing is that research statistics since the 1980s reinforce the problem of increasing violence toward women.  When colleges have to actively deal with date rape and high-school couples include physical abuse as a "normal" part of their relationships, it is time to draw the line. We may have already lost one generation.
    What guidelines does a fourteen year old have to steer though such emotional waters? It might help her to remember our biological difference. For the male of any species sexual intercourse involves projection and release.  For the female it involves opening and receiving. 
   That difference can tell her a lot.

Copyright (c) 2010 Anne Forrest Elmore