The sexual predator, that dark and mysterious figure, the "stranger", unpredictable, hinting at danger, tinged with violence... what is there that so attracts women to him? Truly, there seems something almost magical about those few men who seem able to mesmerize women at will. What secret do they possess that gives them this power, this intensity, this animal magnetism?
Users and manipulators is the key phrase. Such men have learned to spot and sniff out vulnerable women, the "wounded birds", the ones most susceptible to their particular brand of sorcery. They have mastered the art of "pushing the emotional buttons" of their fellow humans, exploiting the feelings and weaknesses of hurt people (and is not most everyone hurt?), playing women like a musical instrument. In their single-minded pursuit of pleasure, of self-gratification, they leave behind them a string of victims. These are haters of women, exploiters of human weakness, parasites, sociopaths*.
This little deviation into the dark alleys of the criminal mind and the
underside of human nature yields insight into the sad emptiness of the
career seducer. There is little to envy in these creatures. They lead
meaningless lives, and each successive "conquest" does nothing to fill
the screaming, hungry void within. There is little to admire, considering
the pain and wreckage they leave behind. We shy men can pride ourselves
in being truly different, in being perceptive, sensitive, caring human
beings, in being lovers of women. We are the ones who clean up the damage
left behind by the monsters and the misbegotten. We bring beauty and
healing into the world.
What a chimera, then, is man! What a novelty, what a monster, what a
chaos, what a subject of contradiction, what a prodigy! A judge of all
things, feeble worm of the earth, depositary of the truth, cloaca of
uncertainty and error, the glory and the shame of the universe.
Blaise Pascal: Thoughts, chap. x. |