Chapter 8, Ethos vs. Eros Summary and Analysis

Chapter 8 extends Sellers's theory that capitalism leads to social repression as a coping mechanism in the formation of the middle class ethos and the repression of sex. Sellers's main argument is that the only way to cope with the economic stress of the market and increasing wage-exploitation is to learn to live with it and this involves a great deal of unhealthy, dysfunctional emotional repression that increases the potential for democratic, antinomian revolution in the form of Andrew Jackson.

Sellers describes campaigns against three activities: pre-marital sex, masturbation and alcohol. The Moderate Light churches begin to decline in influence and turn increasingly towards social matters. They begin to emphasize, for instance, that masturbation is sapping the "vital energies" of young men and that it has to be substantially restricted. In Sellers's view, masturbation is an...