none of that cross-breeding, intergalactic sex, thank you!

 'We expect this sort of thing from trashy U.S. imports but not a well-respected series like Doctor Who.' ~via that bastion of moral clarity, the daily mail.

Oh, Dr! The infinite vision and experience, the pain you carry. That miraculous regenerating flesh. And now this out of wedlock, un-church-sanctified threat of carnal passion.

Dr. Who is for kids like Harry Potter is for kids. Dr. Who fills our need to envision, charting a direction large enough to fit what we know (and suspect) about the cosmos. Sci-fi, like the old religions, the old gods, is like the Tardis, a vehicle to project yourself far enough from the mundane to glimpse both your inner and outer states -- the total psyche -- and the binding, unquestioned parameters of your culture's hold on those states.

You think kids don't have sexual feelings? At five, I was totally in love with Robin Hood (the one with the BBC accent: Richard Greene, The Adventures of Robin Hood. Wow -- did you know Lindsay Anderson directed some of those?). I think I also had a thing for the Sheiff of Nottingham. He was just so evil and had that demonic little beard. But I didn't know the facts of life, the old in-out, not growing up on a farm. But still -- the feelings. The passion and attraction.

I remember being very shocked by it all when I learned about sex. It's so preposterous, and, unless you're actually experiencing the moment, seems to have very little to do with the feelings that caught you up into that act in the first place. Which is why porn and even so many sex scenes in adult movies fail to attract or intrigue me. It's like eating, really. I'm not interested in watching it. Some things are simply not spectator sports. (And if sex is -- what? -- 80% visual as they say it is for men, is not watching porn 80% infidelity?) (Oh, lusting in his heart.) (Kidding!) It's more romantic to have Dr. Who un-entangled: I know he's a passionate being, body and mind. A Time Lord! What an aphrodisiac. He doesn't need anything more than what he simply is. It just breaks the spell. Makes him -- human. Mundane.

(Of course I love the scene, what they did, River Song, all of it.)

Yet, I do love the Greek god statues, those Leda and Swan paintings... But you see, we don't identify with the gods. They embody things beyond our reach. They are awe.

And love is also awe.

On Netflix, I read the reactions to "An Education". It's a marvelous film that understands all I'm trying to get at here: grappling with mysteries, the forces that make life and move the sun and all the stars, how easy it is to lose oneself. Thank the gods Jenny doesn't. Thank Jenny, saved by her own wisdom: her ability to learn. She's far too whole to be cut in pieces, which is what we do with sex. Hell, we sell cars with it, cut it away from Being. But reading the Netflix responses, how many write that they were creeped out by a 30 year-old man seducing a 16 year-old girl -- so creeped out that they missed the point of the film. It's symptomatic of our sexual dysfunction, the way we've divorced body and soul. Romance is eros centered, and we've lost reverence for the eros. And Eros is life itself, life as it moves and lives.

Ah, Jenny. How we love you. How we love our Doctors. As for carnality, it was 1885, an eye-blink ago, that the age of consent was raised in England from 12 to 16, and it took a good long jolly fight to get that passed by Parliament.

I trust adults will grow up at some point. Hollywood is looking for actors who have real, non-silicone bodies. Reality centered bodies. A place where we can fully dwell, where we can travel the cosmos, defy time and space, plant our feet, dance, and get -- educated.

Blessed are the arts.

---

extra credit: STEPHEN HAWKING:TIME LORD

none of that cross-breeding, intergalactic sex, thank you!

 'We expect this sort of thing from trashy U.S. imports but not a well-respected series like Doctor Who.' ~via that bastion of moral clarity, the daily mail.

Oh, Dr! The infinite vision and experience, the pain you carry. That miraculous regenerating flesh. And now this out of wedlock, un-church-sanctified threat of carnal passion.

Dr. Who is for kids like Harry Potter is for kids. Dr. Who fills our need to envision, charting a direction large enough to fit what we know (and suspect) about the cosmos. Sci-fi, like the old religions, the old gods, is like the Tardis, a vehicle to project yourself far enough from the mundane to glimpse both your inner and outer states -- the total psyche -- and the binding, unquestioned parameters of your culture's hold on those states.

You think kids don't have sexual feelings? At five, I was totally in love with Robin Hood (the one with the BBC accent: Richard Greene, The Adventures of Robin Hood. Wow -- did you know Lindsay Anderson directed some of those?). I think I also had a thing for the Sheiff of Nottingham. He was just so evil and had that demonic little beard. But I didn't know the facts of life, the old in-out, not growing up on a farm. But still -- the feelings. The passion and attraction.

I remember being very shocked by it all when I learned about sex. It's so preposterous, and, unless you're actually experiencing the moment, seems to have very little to do with the feelings that caught you up into that act in the first place. Which is why porn and even so many sex scenes in adult movies fail to attract or intrigue me. It's like eating, really. I'm not interested in watching it. Some things are simply not spectator sports. (And if sex is -- what? -- 80% visual as they say it is for men, is not watching porn 80% infidelity?) (Oh, lusting in his heart.) (Kidding!) It's more romantic to have Dr. Who un-entangled: I know he's a passionate being, body and mind. A Time Lord! What an aphrodisiac. He doesn't need anything more than what he simply is. It just breaks the spell. Makes him -- human. Mundane.

(Of course I love the scene, what they did, River Song, all of it.)

Yet, I do love the Greek god statues, those Leda and Swan paintings... But you see, we don't identify with the gods. They embody things beyond our reach. They are awe.

And love is also awe.

On Netflix, I read the reactions to "An Education". It's a marvelous film that understands all I'm trying to get at here: grappling with mysteries, the forces that make life and move the sun and all the stars, how easy it is to lose oneself. Thank the gods Jenny doesn't. Thank Jenny, saved by her own wisdom: her ability to learn. She's far too whole to be cut in pieces, which is what we do with sex. Hell, we sell cars with it, cut it away from Being. But reading the Netflix responses, how many write that they were creeped out by a 30 year-old man seducing a 16 year-old girl -- so creeped out that they missed the point of the film. It's symptomatic of our sexual dysfunction, the way we've divorced body and soul. Romance is eros centered, and we've lost reverence for the eros. And Eros is life itself, life as it moves and lives.

Ah, Jenny. How we love you. How we love our Doctors. As for carnality, it was 1885, an eye-blink ago, that the age of consent was raised in England from 12 to 16, and it took a good long jolly fight to get that passed by Parliament.

I trust adults will grow up at some point. Hollywood is looking for actors who have real, non-silicone bodies. Reality centered bodies. A place where we can fully dwell, where we can travel the cosmos, defy time and space, plant our feet, dance, and get -- educated.

Blessed are the arts.

---

extra credit: STEPHEN HAWKING:TIME LORD

Hello Sweetie.

Stephen wrote:

.... If you consider the developmental movement inward, because the biological/primal fact is we--men and women--are issued from mothers, this asymmetry comes into relief. So, the movement for a woman is via the integration of the discriminating, penetrating animus (or logos brought into consciousness,) is to arrive at the feminine soul, whereas for man, it is via his anima, and, in effect "back to" his feminine soul....

That really gels the meaning, doesn't it. And as we live as individuals, that's where the soul work takes place. Can also marry it to the Apollonian Dionysian continuum.

Funny. When I write fiction -- long works in which you embed seem necessary for me -- I find my sword wielding animus is taking over less. It took almost a decade to finish the last novel, and I understand why now. I was changing. My relationship to my animus was changing. Reading it now, it comes clear. Makes me smile. That's Jung's active imagination.

Observing the collective -- well, just so much conflict going on between the unconscious and the commercial filters (especially re our old fbuddy snake). Public lives, forbidden fruit, droves of classy call girls employed by upstanding righteous leaders. "Suicides" of DC Madams. The internet, so full of perfect strangers. What a crazy culture we have. Interesting years. And we know things are simply changing, growing, working their way out. The filters can interfere in this as it tends its way toward equilibrium, as they always have -- just as they also help slow things down so we can analyze them. But it's the bubbles that filters can erect that keep things apart and thwart growth. The table-ready schemata with super-sized helpings of finger-licking-good confirmation bias. With so much manipulation, I hope the telomeres are strong!

We choose the reality we lean toward. All of us, works in progress.

Best,
Deborah

ps.

Don't know if you watch Dr.Who, but this year's episodes have been about a girl and her animus! The past few years, it's been the doctor appreciating his anima.

Long live Sarah Jane!

Hello Sweetie.

Stephen wrote:

.... If you consider the developmental movement inward, because the biological/primal fact is we--men and women--are issued from mothers, this asymmetry comes into relief. So, the movement for a woman is via the integration of the discriminating, penetrating animus (or logos brought into consciousness,) is to arrive at the feminine soul, whereas for man, it is via his anima, and, in effect "back to" his feminine soul....

That really gels the meaning, doesn't it. And as we live as individuals, that's where the soul work takes place. Can also marry it to the Apollonian Dionysian continuum.

Funny. When I write fiction -- long works in which you embed seem necessary for me -- I find my sword wielding animus is taking over less. It took almost a decade to finish the last novel, and I understand why now. I was changing. My relationship to my animus was changing. Reading it now, it comes clear. Makes me smile. That's Jung's active imagination.

Observing the collective -- well, just so much conflict going on between the unconscious and the commercial filters (especially re our old fbuddy snake). Public lives, forbidden fruit, droves of classy call girls employed by upstanding righteous leaders. "Suicides" of DC Madams. The internet, so full of perfect strangers. What a crazy culture we have. Interesting years. And we know things are simply changing, growing, working their way out. The filters can interfere in this as it tends its way toward equilibrium, as they always have -- just as they also help slow things down so we can analyze them. But it's the bubbles that filters can erect that keep things apart and thwart growth. The table-ready schemata with super-sized helpings of finger-licking-good confirmation bias. With so much manipulation, I hope the telomeres are strong!

We choose the reality we lean toward. All of us, works in progress.

Best,
Deborah

ps.

Don't know if you watch Dr.Who, but this year's episodes have been about a girl and her animus! The past few years, it's been the doctor appreciating his anima.

Long live Sarah Jane!