To Think on One's Feet

Horst P. Horst: Barefoot Beauty (1941)

Feet: some people find them very beautiful and sexually attractive; others think them repulsive and shameful.

But, love 'em or hate them, the fact remains that plates are not without evolutionary, cultural and philosophical importance. Whilst Heidegger makes a huge fuss about the human hand, Bataille is more interested in the foot, particularly le gros orteil, which he regards as the defining feature of man; i.e., that which distinguishes us from other apes.

I don't know if that's true, but the fact that we can stand up and walk tall on our own two feet is certainly crucial. Freud argues that civilization begins with man's fateful decision to adopt an upright posture, with his nose in the air (this latter fact leading directly to the decline in his sense of smell and, subsequently, his association of bodily dirt and odours with shameful animality and base materialism).

Our habitual bipedalism developed rather belatedly in evolutionary terms and the human foot with its unique anatomical structure is a comparatively recent assemblage of bones, joints, tendons, muscles, etc. which might help to explain why our feet are so susceptible to all kinds of problems (from flat feet to swollen feet; from blisters to bunions).

Other maladies - including dodgy knees, bad backs, and hernias - are also associated with the fact that man likes to stand erect. Perhaps this is why in so many cultures feet are held in such low regard; the fact that they are often dirty and prone to sweat also adds to their perceived baseness. Arguably, only the sexual organs have a more degraded status within the heirarchy of the body.

Living as we do, we moderns, from the spiritual upper centres, we dream of becoming angels; i.e., heavenly creatures who have feet that never touch the ground. But, as a Lawrentian and as something of a podophile, I would challenge such idealism. I think we should overcome our secret horror for our terrestrial origins in mud and learn to value the naked reality of feet that are intensely alive with the desire for touch - as well as great centres of resistance with which to kick! 

See: Georges Bataille, 'The Big Toe', Visions of Excess, ed. Allan Stoekl, trans. Allan Stoekl, with Carl R. Lovitt and Donald M. Leslie Jr., (The University of Minnesota Press, 1985), pp. 20-23. Click here to read this essay on line. 

This post is for Mimi.  

Indecent Exposure: Further Thoughts on Male Sexual Display

A male peacock spider putting on an 
impressively iridescent courtship display

I. He Took It Out (Again)

Several days on, I'm still thinking about the case of Louis CK which I discussed at the prompting of (and in collaboration with) the poet and critic Simon Solomon in an earlier post [click here]. In other words, the question of why a man should wish to strip naked and masturbate in front of a clothed woman or group of women, continues to intrigue. 

As I said, I'm prone to see this behaviour as an illicit form of erotic performance - a transgressive but joyful expression of male libido - rather than frame it in moral-legal terms as slightly sad, somewhat sinister sexual misconduct. Nor do I buy into the psycho-political reading advanced by some feminist commentators which regards male exhibitionism as a phallocratic act of terrorism, intended to humiliate, intimidate, or outrage female spectators who maintain their right not to be subject to such displays without prior consent.         

It's mistaken - and possibly dangerous - to demonise men and pathologise their sexuality. And, as Simon Solomon wrote, it's far from clear why being afforded the opportunity to witness somebody pleasure themselves should be construed as inherently traumatogenic.  

II. Homo erectus*

Within the animal world, masturbation and courtship behaviour involving overt sexual display is a given; birds do it, bees do it - even eight-legged critters like the spider shown above do it. All male creatures like to show off and attempt to appear virile and attractive in the eyes of the female; to exhibit their desire and ability to fuck.

Some males do it with song; some males do it with dance. Some males put on bright colours; some engage in mortal combat with other males. But some males get right to the point and expose their genitalia - and there's evolutionary evidence to indicate that the most successful human males have long favoured this tactic.   

Indeed, according to the American anthropologist Nancy Makepeace Tanner, the sexual selection of mates by females on the basis of phallic display was a major factor in the evolution of hominid bipedalism. In other words, men first stood upright in order that the women might better be able to admire their sexual organs. The more visible they could make their penises - and the better endowed they were - the more likely they were to get laid.

For unlike chimps and bonobos that walk on all fours and thus have their (relatively small) genitalia obscured from view, a naked man on two legs has everything out in the open for inspection by potential lovers (and/or potential opponents) and that seems to have been a turn on for ape-women.

Tanner writes:

"Such an image might appear amusing and improbable, but let us remember that these ancient forebears living in the warm African savannas had not yet invented clothing. As the female hormonal cycle and ovulation came to contribute less to timing of her arousal, it is not illogical that visual cues could become increasingly significant. If so, sexual selection for bipedalism would be yet another instance of natural and sexual selection together advancing the species adaptation farther along the same path for both females and males."

Of course, females also valued males with good social skills and intelligence; Tanner isn't denying that. But the ability to stand erect - to exhibit bipedalism and an impressive hard on - significantly increased a male's chances of passing on his genes.   


III. Die großen Ökonomie des Ganzen

Now, none of this is to excuse the behaviour of Louis CK or other men who have indecently exposed themselves and/or masturbated in front women. It's simply an attempt to expand the terms of debate and help provide a new narrative in which we consider the Blakean possibility that just as "The pride of the peacock is the glory of God" and "The Lust of the goat is the bounty of God", so the nakedness of man is divine in origin.

The roaring of lions, the howling of wolves, the raging of the stormy sea, and the ejaculating phallus all belong to a Nietzschean grand economy of the whole and must ultimately be affirmed as such if we are to ever think beyond good and evil (i.e. beyond the standpoint of fixed and absolute moral judgement).

Of course, many - perhaps most - people will find such a general economy of life abhorrent. But I'm hoping that at least some readers of this blog (those whom I term torpedophiles) will recognise a vital philosophical insight when they're offered one ...

See: 

William Blake, 'Proverbs from Hell', The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790-93)

Nancy Makepeace Tanner, On Becoming Human, (Cambridge University Press, 1981), pp. 165-66. 

Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, trans. R. J. Hollingdale, (Penguin Books, 1990), section 23. Nietzsche returns to this idea in his final work, Ecce Homo, and suggests that even the most terrible aspects of reality are more necessary for man as a species than the cherished ideals of humanism. 

*Note: I'm aware, of course, that the earliest bipedal ape-men were around long before Homo erectus; I'm using this designation simply for comic purposes.