Robert Michels Sexual Ethics: a Study of Borderland Questions
The book that I decided to examine was originally written in 1914 by was a German sociologist Robert Michles. He wrote on the political behavior of intellectual elites and contributed to elite theory. He was a student of Max Weber and a friend of Sombart and Loria.
I have chosen the part of the book where Michels writes about the features of the amatory life and it’s manifestation in Italy, Germany and France because this problem of sexual ethics attracts me as I travel a lot and face this in my life. Later in the second chapter the author goes deeper in the history of French, German and Italian extra-conjugal lives and expounds how the prostitution in this countries origins and subsequently developed.
Part II
Borderland problems of the extra-conjugal erotic life.
Chapter I.
Comparative sexual psychology in various contries.
Though love is an impulse based upon sexual differentiation of the man from the woman, it is absolutely regardless of nationality. In this chapter the author shows the manifold of the erotic impulse in different countries.
Michels starts the study of the phenomena of the erotic life with Germans. He claims that however cold and restrained may be Germans in other aspects, they are utterly shameless in love. The ordinary observer would be forced to be patient to shameless lovemaking of young couples before the public eye. On the other hand Italians who seem to be classic “children of nature” from “ardent land of love” prove to be rather shy in such manifestations. Hardly any lovers are to be seen in the streets and if you even see few, they will probably be tourists. If we were to judge of Italian morality by the life on the streets it would be necessary to suppose that all northern poets writing for us love songs of Italy have been liars. It is clear that all we can find out about Italian passion is superlative phraseology. If some foreign traveler expects to see Romeo and Juliet he will be totally disillusioned to find a cabman
I have chosen the part of the book where Michels writes about the features of the amatory life and it’s manifestation in Italy, Germany and France because this problem of sexual ethics attracts me as I travel a lot and face this in my life. Later in the second chapter the author goes deeper in the history of French, German and Italian extra-conjugal lives and expounds how the prostitution in this countries origins and subsequently developed.
Part II
Borderland problems of the extra-conjugal erotic life.
Chapter I.
Comparative sexual psychology in various contries.
Though love is an impulse based upon sexual differentiation of the man from the woman, it is absolutely regardless of nationality. In this chapter the author shows the manifold of the erotic impulse in different countries.
Michels starts the study of the phenomena of the erotic life with Germans. He claims that however cold and restrained may be Germans in other aspects, they are utterly shameless in love. The ordinary observer would be forced to be patient to shameless lovemaking of young couples before the public eye. On the other hand Italians who seem to be classic “children of nature” from “ardent land of love” prove to be rather shy in such manifestations. Hardly any lovers are to be seen in the streets and if you even see few, they will probably be tourists. If we were to judge of Italian morality by the life on the streets it would be necessary to suppose that all northern poets writing for us love songs of Italy have been liars. It is clear that all we can find out about Italian passion is superlative phraseology. If some foreign traveler expects to see Romeo and Juliet he will be totally disillusioned to find a cabman