I watched a show on television today about "Inside-Outside" romances(romances between prison inmates and free individuals).
These people usually meet over internet dating sites where the inmates post their profiles.Other times, (mostly) women seek out inmates through other means and contact them to initiate a relationship.
Some of these relationships last YEARS with one person inside and one person outside. Sometimes, they cant even meet. Other times, they have short and infrequent visits. On occasion, they get married while the inmate is still incarcerated (apparently married men have better chances at parole).
This show made me wonder: why in the world would women walk knowingly into a relationship with someone who is totally "unavailable" to love them back? Why would a woman be with someone who cannot spend time with her, or do any of the things that people do in "normal relationships"?
I think the answer is this: women are suckers for fantasy. These women create fantasies about these men and their relationship and this is strong enough to sustain years without reality.
Why am I posting this here? I think most of you already know where I am going with this.
The reason women so frequently fall for sankies is the same. Fantasy. The short amount of time they spend with the sankie (even if the relationship lasts years, there are usually only week long visits and phonecalls) and the idealic environment of a vacation are conductive to creating a fantasy. The woman goes home and elaborates on it, creating a beautiful story of love that sustains her for long and fullfill hers more than the flawed reality of real, proximal relationships.
It doesnt help, of course, that the sankie (and the inmate) do their best to present themselves in a way that supports the fantasty. It is easy to represent yourself as the knight in shining armour when all you have to do is write pretty letters or say sweet things on the phone once in a while. The same type of charade would be much harder to pull off in "real life".
To extend this idea, in the movie "Meet Joe Black", an old Jamaican lady tries to explain to joe black that fantasy and reality can never really compete; Fantasy always wins. When you're on vacation, because of the short amount of time you spent there, you dont get to experience the bad parts of the island life (or of the sankie) and you leave with an unrealistic (fantastical) image of perfection. Here is a quote (its written with a " Jamaican accent") :
It nice it happen to you. It like
you came to Cat Island and you had
a holiday, sun didn't burn you red,
just brown, sleep no mosquito eat
you, rum no pound you head nex' day.
But trut' is, dat bound to happen,
you stay long enough. So tak dat
nice picture home wi' you, but don'
be fooled. We lonely here mostly,
too. If we lucky, we got some nice
pictures.
The feelings of women toward their sankies (and in my controversial view, many long distance relationships) are built on a foundation of fantasy. It is because this fantasy is so elaborate, so ideallic and so fulfilling that these women find it hard to separate from it. Its just so much better to fantasize about perfection than to live in reality.
I hope that sometime, someone will read this post and see her own feelings in a new way.
These people usually meet over internet dating sites where the inmates post their profiles.Other times, (mostly) women seek out inmates through other means and contact them to initiate a relationship.
Some of these relationships last YEARS with one person inside and one person outside. Sometimes, they cant even meet. Other times, they have short and infrequent visits. On occasion, they get married while the inmate is still incarcerated (apparently married men have better chances at parole).
This show made me wonder: why in the world would women walk knowingly into a relationship with someone who is totally "unavailable" to love them back? Why would a woman be with someone who cannot spend time with her, or do any of the things that people do in "normal relationships"?
I think the answer is this: women are suckers for fantasy. These women create fantasies about these men and their relationship and this is strong enough to sustain years without reality.
Why am I posting this here? I think most of you already know where I am going with this.
The reason women so frequently fall for sankies is the same. Fantasy. The short amount of time they spend with the sankie (even if the relationship lasts years, there are usually only week long visits and phonecalls) and the idealic environment of a vacation are conductive to creating a fantasy. The woman goes home and elaborates on it, creating a beautiful story of love that sustains her for long and fullfill hers more than the flawed reality of real, proximal relationships.
It doesnt help, of course, that the sankie (and the inmate) do their best to present themselves in a way that supports the fantasty. It is easy to represent yourself as the knight in shining armour when all you have to do is write pretty letters or say sweet things on the phone once in a while. The same type of charade would be much harder to pull off in "real life".
To extend this idea, in the movie "Meet Joe Black", an old Jamaican lady tries to explain to joe black that fantasy and reality can never really compete; Fantasy always wins. When you're on vacation, because of the short amount of time you spent there, you dont get to experience the bad parts of the island life (or of the sankie) and you leave with an unrealistic (fantastical) image of perfection. Here is a quote (its written with a " Jamaican accent") :
It nice it happen to you. It like
you came to Cat Island and you had
a holiday, sun didn't burn you red,
just brown, sleep no mosquito eat
you, rum no pound you head nex' day.
But trut' is, dat bound to happen,
you stay long enough. So tak dat
nice picture home wi' you, but don'
be fooled. We lonely here mostly,
too. If we lucky, we got some nice
pictures.
The feelings of women toward their sankies (and in my controversial view, many long distance relationships) are built on a foundation of fantasy. It is because this fantasy is so elaborate, so ideallic and so fulfilling that these women find it hard to separate from it. Its just so much better to fantasize about perfection than to live in reality.
I hope that sometime, someone will read this post and see her own feelings in a new way.