Between torrid passions and those left alone at will, history shows that sex has been the reason for everything!
1. Solimão, the Manipulated
The tenth sultan of the Ottoman Empire had a harem, like every good sultan. Known as Suleiman the Magnificent, he broke social conventions by making his favorite concubine his chief and official wife. Aleksandra Lisowksa was, moreover, foreign - you may know her by her other three names, Roxelana, Khourrem, or Hürrem.
She was famous for instigating political disputes among the king's advisors. And in that culture, no one left the job dismissed - just killed. The first death related to Roxelana was that of the adviser Ibrahim, whom the Sultan replaced by Rustem, option that would have been influenced by the wife.
Except that the thing degringolated after this impulsive marriage: Mustafa, the first-born and heir of the Sultan, was not son of Roxelana. He and Rustem went to war against Persia - and from there, Rustem had rumors that the army longed for the moment Mustafa became a sultan, because Solimon was no older to lead them.
Afraid of being usurped by his own son, Suleiman asked him to come back and introduce himself to defend himself against "false accusations." Mustafa returned and was strangled by his father's order.
Justice to Roxelana: at the time, there was no policy of succession in the Empire. If one of the children (usually the eldest) came to the throne, the brothers were strangled - what other way to avoid disputes, right?
Roxelana was only wanting to protect her three children. It did not work very well: the oldest, in fragile health, died shortly after the murder of the half-brother (tradition says it was disgusting). The survivors, Selim and Bayezid, fought the throne until one ordered the death of the entire family of the other.
2. The revenge of the wife (and lover)
One of the great pirates invading the Chinese seas between the 18th and 19th centuries, Cheng I had a loving relationship with one of his commanders, Cheung Po Tsai. Unable to marry him, he asked to marry Shi Xianggu. She was a prostitute and a specialist in political intrigue, thanks to the secrets she acquired from important clients. Meanwhile, Cheng adopted Cheung Po Tsai as his son and made him the leader of his fleet.
Shi Xianggu, who became known as Madame Ching, approached the stepson and all her husband's sailors. Together, they managed to recruit about 150,000 pirates for their group.
Shortly thereafter, Cheng died, drowned in very suspicious circumstances. It was the ideal timing for Madame Ching to take her place and dominate Pacific piracy. Knowing he needed a male figure at his side, he became the mistress (and later the wife) of the stepson, Cheung Po Tsai.
In a few years, the pair began to lose control of the fleet. They made a deal with the Chinese emperor and were forgiven for piracy. Madame continued smuggling opium and working in the middle. Already Cheung Po turned his coat: he began to chase and destroy all the pirate and smuggling bands he encountered (but he also died young under unknown circumstances).
3. The murderous seduction
John Hinckley did not have ideas in place. Experts to date have not reached a consensus on their diagnosis, but their attitudes fit into erotomania, the obsessive romantic and sexual desire for someone inaccessible - and the certainty that that desire is reciprocated.
It all started when Hinckley watched Taxi Driver, film starring Robert De Niro. Jodie Foster, just 14, played a minor prostitute.
Hinckley was obsessed with the actress. When she went to college in Yale, he walked near campus - and even called her several times. But since she did not seem to care much about him, his great eureka appeared. Jodie would only be attracted to someone on an equal footing. Then Hinckley decided to go down in history. As? Murdering the US president, of course.
He tried with Jimmy Carter but was arrested. He finally reached the tracks in 1981, shooting at Ronald Reagan, newly elected. It went wrong: Reagan survived, Hinckley was arrested and interned for more than 30 years, even though he was found innocent because of insanity. Even at the psychiatric hospital, he was able to smuggle material about his passion.
With all of this, Hinckley was still disappointed by Jodie's lack of reciprocity after what he called "the greatest show of love in the history of the world." Even if Hinckley was healthy and balanced, it was going to happen: years later, Jodie Foster assumed she was a lesbian.
4. The political climber
The Polish Stanislaw Poniatowsk was chosen as king of Poland at a time when the politics of that place chose their kings, rather than the throne being inherited by dynasties on the wire. It may seem very civilized, but Poland was one of the most fragile kingdoms of the 16th century and its lands were disputed by Russia and Prussia, from which it derived Germany.
Poniatowsk spent most of his life in St. Petersburg. There, he met a noblewoman who would become Empress Catherine II - and has been his mistress since he was 23 years old. He tried to take advantage of the relationship by seeking Catherine's support for a coup against the King of Poland at the time. She refused at first, but after the death of the monarch she had tried to use all her influence to put him on the throne.
What Stanislaw did not know was that she hoped that her reign would further weaken Poland and render her completely dependent on the Russian Empire. That was exactly what happened. Unable to contain the tensions in foreign policy, Stanislaw donated a third of the country to the enemies to avoid the war. Then one more. Then the last bit of your territory. With that, the kingdom ceased to exist - and Stanislaw became famous as the last Polish king.
But he was not just a jackass manipulated by Catherine II: the man tried to fight, strengthen the kingdom, pass a constitution and even backed a national revolt. His mistress was so possessed that he sent an escort to accompany him to St. Petersburg, where he remained, rejected and under house arrest, until the end of his life.
5. The brief king (and half Nazi)
Edward VIII, uncle of Queen Elizabeth, was an heir to the throne of the United Kingdom that displeased everyone. Even his father would have said, "When I die, this boy will be ruined in 12 months."
Edward liked to meddle in politics, contrary to the tradition of non-intervention by the English royal family. But more than that, he enjoyed women: from prostitutes to married ladies, Edward was filled with lovers from his youth.
And of course this did not change when he was crowned. Edward met Wallis Simpson, an American who was already in the second marriage and on the way to the next divorce (they were introduced by another married lover of Edward, Lady Furnes). No one wanted the girl to be queen-neither the public, nor the parliament, nor the royal family.
Even Edward's biographers say their relationship was kind of weird. Wallis treated Edward with disregard and filled him with offenses. And the king liked it. It began to run the story, which was the opinion of the king's own mother, that Wallis manipulated the monarch using his "sexual deviations." Translation: king curtia sadomasochism. Type 50 Shades of Gray, but with inverted genres.
Edward decided to marry the girl who supported his peculiar tastes. And the institutional crisis began: the prime ministers of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and South Africa threatened to resign the minute the marriage took place. Such a crisis in a tense Europe (only 3 years before the Second War began) would leave England very vulnerable.
The opposition was more than political: neither English law nor the Anglican Church recognized divorces that were not justified by adultery. And Wallis's first divorce had been for "emotional differences." That is, if they married, they would be accused of bigamy.
Edward even tried to hold the throne, but there was no way. He had to abdicate in favor of Brother Albert, who became King George VI, father of Elizabeth II. Edward spent the rest of his life being socially condemned - but there are evils that come to good. The ex-king was a fan of Hitler. He went to Germany in 1937, made all the Nazi greetings in front of the press and was photographed shaking Adolf's hand. He later stated that "[Edward's] abdication is a serious loss for us. I'm sure we would reach friendly relations through him. If he had stayed, everything would be different. " Come to think of it, thank you, Wallis!
6. Strange party with weird people
Still talking about War II, Senator David I. Walsh was one of the few American politicians to oppose the impending US entry into the conflict. Walsh began to be pressured - even by pro-intervention press vehicles, such as the New York Post.
The newspaper was able to confirm with the owner of a male brothel that the senator made frequent visits to the place. Until then, no big problems. The disaster was pure coincidence: the brothel was chosen as a meeting point by Nazi spies. Walsh even managed to prove to the FBI that he had not talked to any of the country's enemies, but the scandal was never completely silenced.
By:
Ana Carolina Leonardi ( Super Interessante Magazine)