Who you agree with more? Kollontai’s Glass of Water theory or Zalkind’s Twelve Sexual Commandments of the Revolutionary Proletariat? Were they good for 1920s-1930s Soviet Union? What about current implementations, which one would you lean closer to and why?
Could you elaborate on those theories or provide sources where one can read about them?
Sex should be as easy as drinking a glass of water. That’s Kollontai. I’m unsure about Zalkind’s commandments.
Here are the 12 commandments:
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Sexual life shall not develop too early among the proletariat.
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Thou shalt exercise sexual restraint until marriage, and marriage shall take place only upon full social and biological maturity (20-25 years).
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Sexual relations shall be the culmination of a deep and comprehensive sympathy and attachment to the object of thy sexual love.
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The sexual act shall be the final link in a chain of deep and complex experiences binding the lovers together at that moment.
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The sexual act shall not be repeated often.
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Thou shalt not often change thy sexual object. There shall be less sexual variation.
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Love shall be monogamous and monoandrous (one wife, one husband).
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Every sexual act must be committed without forgetting the possibility of conceiving a child – thou shalt always remember thy progeny.
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Sexual selection shall always be conducted along the lines of revolutionary-proletarian class objectives. Elements of flirtation, skirt-chasing, coquetry, and other particular methods of sexual conquest must not be introduced into love relations.
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Thou shalt not be jealous.
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Thou shalt not engage in sexual perversions.
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In the interest of revolutionary expedience, class shall have the right to interfere in the sexual life of its co-members; the sexual shall always be subordinate to class interests, never interfering with the latter, but shall always serve it.
Sounds like it was written by a medieval monk.
Sounds like something Haz would say ngl
I’m an antitheist in no small part to prevent this type of person from wielding power.
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Glass of water theory, definitely.
12C kinda feels like some sorta reactionary dogma in the clothes of “communism”
The commandments seem somewhat reasonable, but it would be reactionary to rigidly enforce it. The other just seems kind of absurd, and as someone mentioned, it’s doubtful Kollontai actually said that.
Apparently Kollontai didn’t develop the Glass of Water theory. I don’t know how true that is, since I’ve never even heard of Kollontai until I read your post, but this article is an interesting read nonetheless: https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/atc/1724.html
For what it’s worth, Lenin calls the “Glass of Water” theory “completely un-Marxist”: https://www.marxists.org/archive/zetkin/1920/lenin/zetkin1.htm
I think he comes off as a bit of a prude in this. Maybe Kollontai sometimes goes a little too far but on the whole I think she has a much more progressive position on the topic of sex than Lenin does.
