Disc: English isn't my native tongue, so bear with me.

Heartiste had a quote from Unwin's "Sex and Culture", and I have already quoted from the book the part which explained Romes decline (see my history of submitted posts; cant crosslink).

However this book is absolutely gold to anyone interested in understanding why the West became the way it is today, and where it is headed.

With these two exceptions the same changes were made successively by the Sumerians, Babylonians, Athenians, Romans, Anglo-Saxons, and Protestant English. These societies lived in different geographical environments, they belonged to different racial stocks, but the history of their marriage customs is the same. In the beginning each society had the same ideas in regard to sexual regulations. Then the same struggles took place, the same sentiments were expressed, the same changes were made, the same results ensued. Each society reduced . its sexual opportunity to a minimum and, displaying great social energy, flourished greatly. Then it extended its sexual opportunity, its energy, decreased, and faded away. The one outstanding feature of the whole story is its unrelieved monotony. I have summarized these changes in matrimonial law so that the whole matter may be discussed from an impressionistic point of view. From a superficial- study of the available data it might be thought that the questions of female subjection and parental power are indissolubly allied to that of female continence; but actually their alliance in the past has been due to the chance factor that sexual opportunity has never been' reduced to a minimum except by depriving women and children of their legal status.

It is historically true to say that in the past social energy has been purchased at the price, of individual freedom, for it has never been displayed unless the female of the species has sacrificed her rights as an individual and unless children have been treated as mere appendages to the estate of the male parent, but it would be rash to conclude that sexual opportunity cannot be reduced to a minimum under any other conditions. The evidence is that the subjection of women and children is intolerable and therefore temporary, but we should go beyond the evidence if, we were to conclude from this fact that compulsory continence also is intolerable and therefore temporary. Such a statement, indeed, is contradicted by the tenor of the whole story.

Unwin then goes on to describe this pattern in detail for a few cultures, and concludes

It is in this manner that the behaviour of these societies was controlled by their methods of regulating the relation between the sexes. In no case was sexual opportunity reduced to a minimum unless married women, and usually unmarried women also, were compelled to suffer legal and social disadvantages. The manner in which the marital and-parental authorities were modified was the same in each society. In every case the same situations arose, the same sentiments were expressed, the same changes were made, the same results ensued. The history of these societies consists of a series of monotonous repetitions, and it is difficult to decide which aspect of the story is the more significant the lamentable lack of original thought which in each case the reformers displayed, or the amazing alacrity with which, after a period. of intense compulsory continence, the human organism seizes the earliest opportunity to satisfy its innate desires in a direct or perverted manner. Sometimes a man has been heard to declare that he wishes both to enjoy the advantages of high culture and to abolish compulsory continence.The inherent nature of the human organism, however, seems to be such that these desires are incompatible, even contradictory. The reformer may be likened to - the foolish boy who desires both to keep his cake and to consume it. Any human society is free to choose either to display great energy or to enjoy sexual freedom, the evidence is that it cannot do both- for more than one generation.

The tradeoff between sexual energy and ``social/productive/expansive'' energy falls under the theory of sublimation - it is the same thing you see in the nofap subreddit.

As Unwins theory goes, the inertia of sexual freedom wrt its effect on productive energy is the reason why the West was still flourishing after the hippy generation began proclaiming free love, beginning the transformation of society in the seventies - just as his theory predicted in 1934. It takes atleast three generations (~ 60-70 years) until the effect gains full momentum. In other words, in 2014 there are still some ancient cultural relicts that help the West to produce productive members of society, but these relicts fade each day. You will see a lot more Tinder(s), and a lot less productive people in the future, with a peak between 2030 and 2040. After that, expect to be conquered by another civilization.