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I don't see fear of sex as Western so much as Christian. Roman Christianity was (and to some extent still is) a kind of extended pathological interlude in the Western tradition - the bastard offspring of a patriarchal Abrahamic and tribal tradition crossed with various shades of Platonism, and given an added boost with a shift towards good old fashioned oligarchic imperialism hidden under a pseudo-spiritual sugar frosting.

If I wanted to play devil's advocate (hmmm...) I'd suggest that it's actually based more on a middle eastern world view.

That's not quite fair because Rome and Greece had a notoriously patriarchal strand. But there was also a more open strand in certain times and places that has been very influential politically and socially in the West, but remains almost totally absent from the Abrahamic mindset even today.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Wed Nov 15th, 2006 at 06:52:58 PM EST
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