Well, I've learned something new today, there's a name for it. Yes, that is exactly what I'm talking about, and I'm glad to see there's so much research on it, I had no idea it had been so well studied. For those who don't care to read it, the synopsis is this, "absolute power corrupts absolutely". And of all the "corruptions" of power, this is the one I see most commonly. I see people with amazing financial control over staggering amounts of money who have never "stuck their hand in the piggy bank". People can act ethically when they have lots of power, it is possible but it is difficult. Particularly, IMHO, when it comes to men and sex.
This is going to come across as blaming the victim, but, it's not, so please don't look at it that way. But I think it comes down to expectations, desire and reality. Let me use the example from before, why do I know men who wouldn't steal a dollar from the company if you left them a vault filled with unmarked bills and very few/no men who would turn down their 20 year old secretary for a BJ under the desk? IMHO, it comes down to what they really desire vs what they already have. So, let's say we put the CFO of my company into the vault. This guy's total comp is in the neighborhood of 5M a year. He's got a few houses, nice cars, a huge severance package coming to him if we fire him, the respect of his peers and industry, and a job that validates him constantly for how good he is at his work. So, back to the vault, do I have any concern about him taking a few stacks of 100's? Or bringing in a suitcase and taking a few M out the back door? No, I don't. Because he's already so rich, what's he going to do with another few M bucks? The upside isn't worth it, money can no longer motivate him and he's "ethical" because he's so satiated on money that there's no chance he'll make the effort to steal.
But take that same guy, put him in the vault with a really attractive girl from HR who's been told "If you get him to sleep with you, you'll be set for life financially" and now what? Would I trust him if that girl was my daughter or niece? Nope, no more than I'd trust a fall down drunk with a "loan" for 10 bucks to buy another case of beer. What changed? Why did "Mr. Won't Steal a dime" suddenly become morally deficient?
It comes down to "riches". The CFO is rich beyond rich when it comes to money. There's almost nothing he can't buy already so there's almost no chance of him taking more. But sexually, if he's like most guys I know, he considers himself a pauper. Now, this is where the "expectations" come in, perhaps his expectations are WAY out of line, I'm not going to argue that. But he considers himself sexually "starved". That attractive girl in the vault with him is offering him something that's far more attractive than money, and he, like many other powerful men, is much more likely to put his hand in the piggy bank if it's sex on offer vs money. And you can see this in our HR department, as long as I've been with the company, I can't remember us discharging a single high level employee for theft. But in the past year, I can recall 2 who were fired for sexual things (one was sleeping with a client, the other with an employee). Both guys making big bucks, still not enough to keep them from dipping into the company pot for sex.
I read a study a few years ago talking about preferred sexual frequency between men and women in a committed relationship and, while I was shocked by the numbers; I wasn't at all shocked by the ratios. IIRC, most men wanted sex 2-3 times a week, women 2-3 times a month and the actual was about 1X per week. The number that shocked me in there wasn't the 1X per week, it was that most men reported 2-3X per week as the "preferred frequency". I don't know a single guy who would say that. Guessing, of course, I think the most common answer is probably daily or twice a day for most guys I know. As an aside, when you look at a PA, it seems that most skew towards the male preferred frequency. Very often it's "every time" they are together or "several times a day" when they are together. I have my suspicions as to why this is the case, but, I just thought I'd throw it in here as a discussion point.
Back to the main point; there are a lot of rich men having a lot less sex than they want to have. Couple that with ease of sexual access when you're rich (or famous) and well, is it really any surprise what happens? It reminds me of the experiment where you put a hungry child in a room with cookies, tell them not to eat any, and then leave to room and see what happens. Most will resist for some time and then give in. And while we could never test this, a starving child, I'd venture to say, will never refuse it. Well, what if that "starving child" is actually 100 lbs overweight? They're not starving, they just feel like they are? I think that's a lot of what happens, no, you're not starving, in fact, your fat! But the subjective experience for that fat child looking at the cookies, is it any different than the starving child? I'm not sure it is, in fact, if anything, it might be worse. When you starve your body, it stops wanting food eventually, so, if anything, the overweight kid might want the cookie MORE than the child who's actually starving.
Is there a solution to this problem? Maybe, but what "solves" this problem is likely to cause a whole host of other problems. Simulated/virtual sex will probably get to the point in the next 20-30 years where it eclipses real sex for how enjoyable it is physically. When that happens, and people have unfettered sexual access to the subjective "best" sexual experiences, I think we'll see a lot more CFO with money behavior among men because they, like the CFO, will be rich. Why steal when you've got all the money you can ever spend at home? Yes, it will still happen, just like every now and again you find a really rich person stealing from petty cash. But it's a lot rarer; people who do that do it for the thrill of theft, not because they actually want the thing they are stealing and that's a very different pathology.
I'll wrap up with this, while this might sound like I'm excusing men for A's, that's not at all the message I intend to deliver. Your not f**king starving a**hole!! You might feel like you are, but you're not. You can masturbate like the rest of us if you're really that horny. You can talk to your wife and try to improve things. Or you can get a D and live a single life and have all the unmarried women you want. So this in no way is intended to excuse men for A's or, alternately to shame women for their sexual preferences or desired frequency, just like I can't will myself to want sex once a week, my wife cannot will herself to want sex once a day. What I can do is control my actions and compromise. And that last word, "compromise" is a concept that's very foreign to many powerful/rich men. Likely the reason we're seeing yet another headline with a story that's as old as the day is long.
