A slideshow at the NY Post shows participants from the "world's largest swinging convention" held in New Orleans, and the average age looks like 50 to 60. The one woman who was under 40 was photographed twice in a desperate attempt to make it look not so geriatric.
The under-50 generations may be more likely to "support" deviance of many kinds, but less likely to actually practice them. Boomer women are sluts, while Gen X and Millennial women are thots (attention whores).
What is the appeal of swingers' clubs? It's related to the outgoing social atmosphere, rather than the cocooning one. Swingers are not simply couples who have open relationships -- they want to meet up in the same location and get it on in a crowd setting, unlike doing it in the privacy of your own home.
They seem to get a rush from feeding off of all the other activity going on around them. This preference also drove the trend of orgy scenes in old porno movies.
It may also help with their self-consciousness, losing themselves in a faceless crowd in the dark, similar to dancing in a nightclub rather than dancing with only your partner in the room at home. The herd mindset helps them get over their inhibitions -- they feel like they're just passively conforming to the environment, not choosing to act out.
This need to overcome inhibitions and remove personal responsibility is common to deviance, showing up also among gays, who prefer dark faceless crowd settings to suppress the awareness that what they're doing is wrong (everybody else is doing it, as it were, so it can't be wrong).
Swingers' clubs took off during the Disco era, and pictures from the time show the couples to be mostly 30-somethings. Those would be the Silent Generation, who also made up the bulk of the hippie and counter-culture phenomenon a decade earlier (Boomers were still in school). The Silents were raised during the cocooning Midcentury, and were the most desperate to indulge themselves once the zeitgeist became more outgoing, fun-loving, and rising in crime rates circa 1960. They were also the ones who made up the divorce epidemic of the time.
Well, 40 years later and the average birth year of swingers has only budged 10 to 20 years later than the Silents. That shows a strong cohort effect that lasts throughout the lifetimes of the Silent and Boomer generations (together the Me Generation), who became adults during the outgoing and rising-crime period of roughly 1960 to 1990.
Gen X and Millennials, who became adults during the cocooning and falling-crime period of roughly 1990 to present, did not socially imprint on a climate of "if it feels good, do it". However, when the climate does become outgoing and rising-crime again, the Millennials will repeat the history of their Silent Gen counter-parts, who were raised by helicopter parents and socially sheltered, and who will jump at the first chance to lose control when the culture finally does change to a more freewheeling zeitgeist.
Gen X, like their Greatest Gen counter-parts, will be too old to get in on the surge of degeneracy among 30-somethings, who by that time will be Millennials.
I explored these themes in depth during 2010-2012 (see the archive at the right of the page), if you've only started reading here during the past few years. Here are related posts on the decline in flashing and streaking, and the graying of nudists who cannot recruit anyone under 40.
"The one woman who was under 40 was photographed twice in a desperate attempt to make it look not so geriatric."
ReplyDeleteYeah, they become propagandists trying to sell it rather than document it. Notoriously done at gay pride parades. Eww, did you see the horrific clip of a little girl watching a nude or nearly nude man dance and then he's joined by another who gives him oral sex? And all those people just stood by or even watched her watching them?!
Btw, 5/21 pic (party dirty), on hefty older woman with guy with advanced metabolic syndrome man...Eww!
I've been here for years and highly recommend Age's older posts he alluded to. So right on the Silents, I think of the 60s-70s as the Dirty Old Man Era. Maybe another reason why the 80s were great: fewer ugly leches running around.
I always felt lucky being born in the late 70s because the 60's and 70's guys were the most down to earth and spiritual. Just all-around great.
I don't know why, but a Gen X serial killer of the Bundy-Ripper-Lucas type is rarer than hen's teeth and the crime wave doesn't explain it. Suspect an entitlement attitude has a bit part to play, but anyway, don't want to sidetrack the post.
Not just a high-crime thing, but also a liberal thing. "Swinging" wasn't as common in the 80s, when defense spending went up, and the government pursued conservative politics. Recently, in the 2010s, when defense spending has gone down, and the government pursued liberal policies - swinging morphed into "open relationships", accompanying "braindead feminism". Don't know if there was a swingers revival in the 90s(low defense spending), but there was a huge dance music craze similar to the 70s.
ReplyDeleteAbstract-oriented liberals are less sexually possessive, even though conservatives tend to be more promiscuous. Or maybe they just let their wives talk them into it.
Exhibitionism is tied to the crime rate, but the form it takes changes depending on liberal or conservative politics. Why, for instance, was streaking and swinging more common in the 70s, and wet t-shirt and bikini contests more common in the 80s, etc.?
Liberal vs. conservative does not oscillate every decade -- it's around 20-30 years.
ReplyDeleteThe Disco era was not one of liberal politics -- that was "the Right turn" in American politics, with Jimmy Carter running on being a Southern born-again Christian who would go on to brag about how much he deregulated the airlines, railroads, etc., in the debate with Reagan in 1980.
And swingers' clubs did run into the '80s. The biggest one in New York City was Plato's Retreat, opening in 1977 and only getting closed by the city government in 1985 because they were closing up all the gay bathhouses after the gays caused the AIDS epidemic. The city said they didn't want to discriminate, so the hetero sex houses had to close, too.
It moved to Fort Lauderdale, Flahrida, where it stayed open.
On a random episode of Forensic Files tonight, a wife was murdered by her husband who was in an open relationship. A family friend recounted a New Year's Eve party they held where the whole plan was wife-swapping. It was around 1983.
Thanks for the clarification. I may have overspoke saying liberal and conservative, but based on this graph from CNN, it does seem that defense spending goes in 10-year cycles, at least since Vietnam.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cnn.com/2017/03/01/politics/trumps-proposed-defense-spending-echoes-previous-wartime-eras/index.html
Furthermore, I do remember you saying ages ago that there is a 10-year cycle involving aesthetic styles - bombastic and attention-getting(bright colors) in the 80s, vs. low-key, moderate colors in the 70s, and thought this might indicate other things as well.
I don't know why, but a Gen X serial killer of the Bundy-Ripper-Lucas type is rarer than hen's teeth and the crime wave doesn't explain it.
ReplyDeleteThe vast majority of Gen X serial killers are black, which is why the nearly all famous killers are Silents and Boomers; America's white majority population is disinterested in ghetto bloodletting. The Ghetto baby boom of the 60's-early 90's is largely responsible for the still relatively high crime rate of the 90's-present day, with large numbers of MS-13 type foreigners doing their part, too. The black birth rate has significantly declined since the mid 90's, with very positive implications for the crime in future decades (but be patient, the massive early 90's black cohort is stirring shit up as we speak and we'll be dealing with early Millennial blacks for decades to come, much like how Gen X blacks were and still are such a pain in the ass.
Decadence+high black birth rates=dystopia.
Whites are much less outgoing than blacks, more conformist, too. Whites, especially Gen X-ers, were quicker to cocoon and stop fighting/having sex/doing drugs in the late 80's/1990's than their black counterparts. Also, IQ and temperament wise, the decadent vibe that won dominance in 1968 has been much more damaging to blacks than to whites, for obvious reasons.
http://www.practicalhomicide.com/Research/BlackSexSerKillers.htm
" In 1980 Black sexual serial killers accounted for approximately 21.7% of the murders. Black sexual serial killer doubled between 1991 and 2000 to 50.6% and then peaked at 70.1% between 2001 and 2012. "
In other words, blacks punched above their weight even in 1980 when we had a massive bulge of young white men. White male birth cohorts have gradually shrunken since the late 60's, generational and cultural factors keep Gen X and Millennial whites from being as crazy as Boomers, and thus blacks now account for an astonishing amount of America's violent crime.
"The Disco era was not one of liberal politics -- that was "the Right turn" in American politics, with Jimmy Carter running on being a Southern born-again Christian who would go on to brag about how much he deregulated the airlines, railroads, etc., in the debate with Reagan in 1980."
ReplyDeleteI think we need to distinguish between political and cultural trends; they're not necessarily mutually inclusive. The political zeitgeist of the 30's-60's was overwhelmingly liberal (robber barons taking a backseat, growth of unions, pro-worker immigration policies, increased workplace regulation and job security/pensions, gov. programs grow in size and popularity, etc.). Culturally, though most people were quite conservative well into the 60's (property crime was low in 1960-1966, the vast majority of men were clean shaven, film censorship did not allow the villain to win, etc.).
Basically, political liberalism and cultural conservatism is wholesome (G.I.s), while political conservatism and cultural liberalism is decadent (Boomers). A lot of our fondness for the 80's is based on cultural conservatism making a decent comeback, even if the decadence set in motion by the late 60's had gathered such momentum that there's no way we'd stop it after just 15 or so years.
Bernie Sanders is a good sign; what's wrong with socialism after 40+years of pro-Robber Barron policies? It's not like the capitalists powers that be want to dissolve national borders, destroy affordable health care, and remove every last impediment to monopolies, right? But that never stops the Ann Coulters from claiming that gubmint meddling alone is why the sublime market doesn't work as it should. How can the GOP and DLC wonder why they managed to alienate so many working/middle class people?
Mentioning open relationships does remind me that it seems that as the population of swingers is aging out that there's a concerted attempt to replace it with "polyamory" and open relationships. Although that's less about mindless hedonism (at least on one party) and more in line with modern social justice and feminism stuff since it's almost exclusively pushed by women as a way to sleep around on their man who, more of than not, becomes a depressed and miserable sad sack who grows increasingly alone and withdrawn trying desperately to justify his present state as empowering for his wife and thus part of the greater good.
ReplyDeleteJames Gunn just got exposed for writing hundreds of perv tweets, most of which date to 2009-2011. A lot of references to rape and pedophilia (w/boys being more frequently mentioned). He grad. from high school in 1984, so he probably was born in '65 or '66.
ReplyDeleteWhether he's actually done anything physically or not, I dunno. But how often are we seeing Boomers (and near Boomers) demonstrate no self control or propriety, well into older age? It's a different time now, whether Boomers like it or not.
Counter intuitively, it seems as if a declining crime rate actually benefits criminals more than it does law-abiding people. Criminals or other malcontents get better integration during a cocooning phase. Why is this?
ReplyDeleteLow levels of trust may make it harder for a community to suppress its bad elements. When people interact less, they're less likely to share information and identify a certain person as being bad; furthermore, a bad person is less likely to "act up" and give away his cover when there's not much interaction. Cocooning generally makes it easier to manipulate the expectations of other people, because you don't have to perform as often.
Movies made during cocooning periods are more sympathetic towards criminals or cruel behavior. As the younger generation is less assertive, they fantasize about teaming up with someone older and more ruthless - takes a bully to beat a bully. So, for instance, if you watch the John Wayne movies, a lot of times he has a younger sidekick is meant to be a stand-in for the Silent Generation movie watcher. You saw that in a lot of the 50s movies - the hero being someone in 30s/40s, often with a conniving or ruthless personality, but played off as being a lovable rogue.
ReplyDelete(that's another thing - the age of movie heros goes up during the cocooning periods, with less movies featuring teenagers as protagonists - that trend obviously reversed in the 70s/80s)
Another factor is that audiences lose touch with the reality of crime and how bad criminals really are.
The success of discount stores appear to correlate with cocooning and the decline in crime. In a recent article about the rise of TJMaxx, I caught this:
ReplyDelete"Rising sales are nothing new for these discounters. TJX's have expanded for 22 straight years."
https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/30/business/tjmaxx-marshalls-homegoods-ross-burlington/index.html
Rising inequality surely plays a role as well, yet the figure of "the past 22 years" implies that cocooning plays an important role, since stores like TJMaxx and Ross weren't popular in the 80s.
We've seen a decline in traditional department stores, such as Macy's and Sears, as well. Those stores were popular in the mid-century, but there may have been something different about them back then, caused by cocooning.
The design of department stores like Macy's and Sears have a grandeur, that hints at the possibility of adventure - similar to malls themselves. They create more of an emotional reaction. Finding the kiosks can be difficult, which creates more of a labyrinthine, mystical feel.
ReplyDeleteIn a previous post, you talked about how movie theaters also used to be more labyrinthine, and created more of a sense of ritual.
This is not the case with the discount stores like Target and TJ Maxx, which are bland looking, have only one floor, more like a supermarket.
Another factor may be that cocooning customers think of the idea of a "discount store" as being empowering - the same impulse behind positive psychology, "taking control of your life", etc.