So...this is a follow up to the discussion I posted with regard to The Price of Pleasure movie, (the Two Intense Movies post)...
If anyone reads this, what do you think about the following:
How can we learn about sex? How can we get a good education on it? How do we learn what is "right" in a relationship?
Or, more seriously: how can we learn about what constitutes violence or rape in a relationship?
I think we've got some issues as a society when (as I learned from Vagina Monologues) 1 in 3 American women experiences sexual violence in her lifetime. What's our plan to solve this? (Even as individuals?)
Early, straightforward exposure to the subject, stressing the respect of personal space and safe sex practices. Preferably an explanation not involving storks. Or, we can continue teaching only abstinence, raising our children in an environment of shame and self-loathing. You know, whatever floats your boat.
ReplyDeleteFor us more aged specimens, communicate communicate communicate. Sex between two consenting adults begins with consent, then moves on to the couple's (or more, if that's your cup of tea) definition of sex. Eventually, as the relationship grows emotionally, with a good, solid foundation of communication, so it will grow physically, and that definition will redefine itself with experience. Most of all, we need to stop demonizing sexual contact. The more we consider it taboo, the less we talk about it, and the less we talk, it's that much less we know about our partners. And a lack of knowledge leads us to make uninformed, dangerous decisions instead of rational, healthy ones.
Or something like that. I dunno. I have about as much sex as a carrot these days.
How can we learn about sex? How can we get a good education on it?
ReplyDeleteWell, to start at the beginning, I don't think children should be actively sheltered from knowing about the existence of sex. What is with this idea that children are supposed to remain sheltered from this knowledge until they hit puberty? IMHO, it just doesn't work like that. By the time many consider it appropriate to talk to their kids about sex, they have already absorbed all kinds of messages about it from the people and culture around them.
I have only my own experience to draw on here, but I think I would have been much more ready for adolescence if my (fairly liberal minded) parents had been more upfront about what sex is when they first told me where babies come from. By the time I really learned what sex was, I had long since absorbed some very negative views about women who engaged in it. I knew that society looked down on openly sexual women, and that made me determined not to be one, and this was without the aid of any porn or other material that children are not supposed to be exposed to. I ended up some really messed up views, including that rape was a "safer" subject to fixate on erotically than consensual sex, because “everyone” knew it was wrong anyway, and for some reason violence is held in higher esteem than sex in this society.
I just wish someone had told me flat-out that society is wrong to view women's sexuality the way it does, and I wish that had happened before it became an issue for me. I think that if more children were told this and possibly encouraged to look critically at views of male and female sexuality from an earlier age there would be a lot less sexual assault.
Of course, many traditional or conservative parents would almost certainly disagree with me and be horrified by these suggestions, which kind of puts my ideas in the “not likely to happen” category on a society-wide level.
How do we learn what is "right" in a relationship? Or, more seriously: how can we learn about what constitutes violence or rape in a relationship?
Well, maybe we could start with “no means no under any circumstances” and “it’s wrong to hit (unless the other person really wants you to and you’ve agreed on safewords and boundaries beforehand).”
I think we've got some issues as a society when (as I learned from Vagina Monologues) 1 in 3 American women experiences sexual violence in her lifetime. What's our plan to solve this? (Even as individuals?)
Well, there’s always things like speak-outs to make more people aware of the problem or that they’re not alone in their experiences. We can continue to tell everyone that no means no and only yes means yes.
Hugo Schwyzer did a good post a while back where he brought up the concept of “enthusiastic consent” rather than simply consent as the opposite of rape.
http://hugoschwyzer.net/2008/06/15/the-opposite-of-rape-is-not-consent-the-opposite-of-rape-is-enthusiasm-a-revised-and-expanded-post/
"We need to make the case that consent is not enough. Great sex – ethical sex – is rooted less in mutual agreement than in mutual enthusiasm. It’s about moving from a “yes” to a “Hell, yes!”" - Hugo Schwyzer
ReplyDeleteNow that's something I can get on board with.
More from Hugo:
ReplyDelete"One problem we addressed then – and which still needs addressing today – is what I’ve come to call the “stoplight” phenomenon. Traffic signals, of course, have three colors: red for stop, yellow for caution, green for go. Good drivers are taught to stop on “red”, which functions as a “no”. But of course, even at the busiest urban intersections, no light stays red indefinitely. If you wait long enough at a stoplight, every red will become green. And when all we do is teach young men that “no means stop” when it comes to sexual boundaries, we often send them the message that if they just wait long enough (or pester, push, nag, beg, play passive-aggressive games) they’ll get the “green light” they’re so hungry for. Good “sexual boundaries workshops” must go beyond the “no means no” message. Specifically, we looked at the ways in which many men will accept a “no” as a “yellow light” rather than a red, assuming that if they simply keep up unrelenting pressure (often abetted by alcohol or exhaustion) they’ll get the permission they seek.
This stoplight analogy is particularly helpful if we consider the meaning of the “yellow”. In driver’s education classes, students are taught that yellow means “slow down”. Of course, most folks on the surface streets of this country interpret it rather differently in practice; for all too many, a yellow means “Gun it, before it turns red!” Our cultural stereotypes about rape and consent involve a similar disconnect between what makes sense and what often happens in reality. In our imagination, a rapist is someone who “runs the red light” in blatant disregard of a clear, unambiguous “no”. But while that may be what is needed to meet the legal definition of rape, this understanding ignores the complexity of consent – and enthusiasm. It’s not uncommon for, say, a young woman to be eager to “make out” with a guy she likes. She may send a clear message of “yes” to kissing and caressing. She may not, for example, want to take off her pants or have the guy try and take them off for her. She may push his hands away when he tries to unbutton them, all the while kissing him with apparent excitement. Contrary to what some argue, she’s not sending a mixed message at all. Her enthusiasm for one set of pleasurable activities does not vitiate her right to reject something “more.” There is never a point past which consent cannot be withdrawn.
Just like at an intersection, a yellow light ought to be interpreted as a signal to slow down. In most sexual encounters, consent is fluid: with each kiss and caress it is negotiated. The currency of that negotiation is desire; not the desire to just “get it over with” but authentic arousal. Sometimes, we might want to be grabbed passionately and have our partner’s hands immediately on our genitals; other times, we might want a much-longer period of foreplay. We have the right to insist that we go no further than we are ready to go at any given moment. A “not yet” might, in a matter of only a few moments, turn into a “God, please, now!” For young people, so often so awkward (and, too often, intoxicated) it can be all too easy to miss non-verbal signals."
Copied from: http://hugoschwyzer.net/2008/06/15/the-opposite-of-rape-is-not-consent-the-opposite-of-rape-is-enthusiasm-a-revised-and-expanded-post/