Love Vs Dominance

Cost: 200 Bhat for food

If the cost poses a major problem, please reach out to the event organizers!

Introduction: Join us for a discussion regarding the contamination of love by the human need for control and safety. How do we deal with implicit power dynamics in our creation of equal, respectful, and truly loving relationships (be them platonic, familial, communal, or sexual)?

Description:

In the current milieu of Western culture, we might identify two opposing value systems and world views that account for the media portrayal of mounting tension: one centered around love and one centered around dominance.

In one view, the human being is inherently relational. We identify as communal, and our communities identify themselves as members of larger ecological or metaphysical systems that might even be deified.

In the other, the survival of the human being demands competition, control, and dominance of the Other, manifesting interpersonally and (getting meta here) even within/across the psyche of individuals. In such a system, hierarchy (and capitalization of one's position of dominance within that hierarchy) is permitted and embraced in policy/decision-making, resource distribution, and even in weighing the value of one life against another.

One perspective sees the world as inherently collaborative. The other, inherently competitive. Likely, neither perspective is universally truthful. Each has their domains of application. But, today, we will be talking about which of these worlds bears on our intimate, person-to-person relationships: platonic, familial, communal, or sexual.

Join us to discuss the relevance of these worldviews insofar as they inescapably manifest in our meaningful, human relationships.