Marriage, designed to regulate female eroticism, instead destroys it
Evidence
We have seen, though, that woman’s erotic possibilities are almost indefinite. This contradiction points up the fact that marriage, claiming to regulate feminine eroticism, kills it. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1179
Categorization
- XREF: Builds directly on earlier chapters establishing woman’s ‘almost indefinite’ erotic capacity; here Beauvoir turns that freedom into the measure of marriage’s destructiveness. — connects to: Universal social inhumanity takes revenge on marriages that seemed exempt — Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia: Reflections from…, 27; Greek misogynist satire targeted marriage itself, disguising women’s real domestic power — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 192; Sexual technique alone cannot produce desire within marriage’s constraints. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1160 (+6 more)
- ADDENDUM: Could support the ‘immodesty’ article’s theme that male regulation of female sexuality historically ends up mutilating rather than civilizing it.
Broader Connections
- Marriage’s ethical dignity actually suppresses rather than dignifies women’s sexuality
#corroborates(0.95) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1136 - Marriage’s frustrated eroticism causally drives wives into adultery
#expands(0.90) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1617 - The new morality condemns marriage and prostitution as forms crushing erotic life
#corroborates(0.85) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 862 - Married partners invent erotic fantasies to restore the alterity marriage erased
#responds-to(0.80) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1194 - Convention-based marriage cannot reliably generate love or lifelong sexual satisfaction
#expands(0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1191