The Oneida Community

The Oneida community seems to have been another one of those rather odd things to come out of the empire state. Founded in Oneida, New York by John Humphrey Noyes, and based on the theory that the community could bring about Jesus' Millennial Kingdom as well as the principles of Perfectionsim. Perfectionism is based on the idea that man could reach a state of being without sin at conversion, this mostly came from Noyes own view that he himself was sinless and therefore capable of throwing stones. The community itself followed four unorthodox, for the time, practices: Male continence, complex marriage, ascending fellowship, and mutual criticism all of which were based around sex, except for that last one. All three sexual practices were practiced to impede any chance of romantic relationships as these were considered "idolatrous," and so everyone was basically married to everyone else, if I have worked the math out right. This commingling among each other sharing bodies and experience, older women were chosen to induct virgins, would be fascinating to Whitman. This is shown in passage like the 28th bather or when he says we states the we have, "plunged your tongue to my barestript heart." But there is something else that Whitman may not have been so excited about regarding the Oneida community. The practice of mutual criticism in which all members participated in criticizing other members, pointing to their bad traits. This may not seem so bad, even somewhat democratic, but the practice was used primarily to enforce the morality of Noyes' doctrine. The critcism points that Noyes' way is the only way. I simply cannot see Whitman backing such a ridiculous idea, when such a group already goes so beautifully against normal societal constructs of sexual relationships; and then ruins that practice by stating there's is the only way.