Social media killed eroticism but not because you get to see tits and ass all the time

Eroticism is the distance between you and the attainment of your desire. If easy access to tits and ass killed eroticism that would imply that all of our primary desires are to see tits and ass. Now seeing tits and ass is great but I highly doubt that this is where the desire ends for most of us. 

So if tits and ass is not what we are really after where did eroticism go?

Georges Bataille described eroticism as an attempt o make our discontinuous selves experience continuity. 

You are a discontinuous being. You are born alone and die alone. The discontinuous self. Through eroticism we can find continuity through the fusing with another. For a brief flash moment we become one and there’s a bridge over the gulf between my discontinuous self and your discontinuous self. We feel connected to source and to each other. 

Prior to social media we’ve attained this sense of continuity through eroticism, religious & psychedelic experience, and death (legacy, our work, memory). 

“Continuity is what we are after, but generally only if that continuity is not the victor in the long run” 

Because if we are in full time continuity that is the death of the discontinuous self. You stop being you, with all your quirks, dreams, goals, and memories. The individual discontinuous self ceases to exist in continuity.  

Now with social media, we have full time access to the state of continuity. My thoughts become your thoughts, your thoughts become his thoughts. Our individual discontinuous selves are sacrificed to the infinity of the internet. Through your profile and your posts you’ve assured your continuity. 

“Continuity is what we are after, but generally only if that continuity is not the victor in the long run” 

This is not an argument for individualism or contrarianism. But the return of the erotic in the 21st century entails rebellious and mindful consumption of our continuity as well as frequent contemplations on our own mortality. we’re being erotically wall-e’d 

Which leads me into my next theory that in 5-10 years only intelligent and motivated people will maintain the ability to become erotically aroused because so much of eroticism is prohibition and the overcoming of obstacles. And with the literacy crisis and the open access sex to and death on the internet the only thing that will be prohibited is free and creative thinking. It’s like the funhouse mirror of idiocracy. So read a book if you wanna stay horny.