Reclaiming sex

[LenochkaO]

I'm not sure why, or whether it's appropriate for this forum, but I felt that some of you might have interesting opinions about this article.

For me, the sentence "We can discuss at length the proclivities of a photogenic teen we'll never meet, while still unable to tell our partner that we don't like the way they perform oral sex." immediately called to mind the debate over Y & L's sexuality.

I don't think the tabloids necessarily have an adverse effect on people's ability to express their desires, but neither do I think they have a particularly positive effect. It's just strange that a lot of people can discuss the ins and outs ('scuse pun) of a celebrity's sex life without being able to discuss their own satisfactorily with a partner. Of course, part of this is that the celebrity's never going to know what you're saying and therefore won't be hurt, while it can be difficult to say to a partner "no, don't do it like that, do it like th...aah, that's it"

So, any comments?

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Kiss and tell

A tabloid obsession with celebrities' sex lives makes it harder for the rest of us to express our real desires

Libby Brooks
Wednesday July 23, 2003
The Guardian

It takes a fair bit to get my teenage brother reading. It is usually only documents incorporating the phrases "with extra fries" or "additional bonus track feat. Eminem" that he deems worthy of perusal. So it was with delight that I watched him devour the novel I'd given him last weekend.
I wasn't mightily surprised. It was, after all, a pretty dirty book. Doing It, an explicit account of adolescent male sexuality by the award-winning children's author Melvin Burgess, has garnered a heap of controversy since it's publication. The children's laureate Anne Fine denounced it as "vile ... foul and deluded". But I bought it for my brother, who is 16, because it is an honest and deeply moral exposition of the charmlessness and vulnerability of teenage desire.

The definition of and response to sexual honesty is often perverse in its execution. Thus Burgess is slated for acknowledging that teenaged boys can be pretty filthy in their relentless pursuit of a grope, while the same lads can read all about the latest celebrity virginity spat in Heat magazine without sanction.

This week Heat has run an exclusive interview with Pop Idol runner-up Gareth Gates, in which he finally details his affair with the glamour model Jordan. Gates had previously denied her claims that she had relieved him of his virginity, a fact that led Jordan to brand him "a coward and a liar". Whatever the intricacies of their liaison, one can confidently expect them to be laid out in unedifying detail across the tabloid press for weeks to come.

Britney Spear's admission that, contrary to earlier insistence, she did have sex with her ex-boyfriend Justin Timberlake (but only two years into the relationship, and because she thought he was "the one" - impressionable fans take note) was greeted with similar hysteria.

In the previous issue of Heat, Charlie's Angels star Drew Barrymore discusses frankly why she enjoys sleeping with women, while some inventively angled photography reveals what may or may not be Pamela Anderson's labia majora. Just another week in our sexually saturated popular culture.

And this is how it works. The acceptable subject areas are closely prescribed - virginity, loss and maintenance thereof; bisexuality (women's); prowess and endurance (men's). For those who rely upon their talent for exposure as much as their talent, such simulacra of sexual honesty become their currency.

Yet the opposite is true for those whose lives are not legitimised by double-page spreads. And those who attempt to fathom the more mundane, though ultimately more revealing, truths about sexuality are greeted at best with suspicion.

Consider the author Nikki Gemmel, whose recent novel, The Bride Stripped Bare, charts the erotic hinterland of a suburban housewife. Gemmel hoped to publish the book anonymously, but the prospect of a British Belle du Jour proved too much for the publicity machine - her identity was leaked, she was doorstepped and exposed in the press. Not bad for sales, granted, but not good for the aspiration that an honest account of married sexual life might be considered without the requisite nudge-nudge.

Whether it's gruesome details in glossies, the buffet of erotic templates available to us is ever-expanding. But for all we are overinformed about how they do, and how we could, do it, does this really bring men and women any closer to developing a common erotic language?

And, oh, how we need one. A damaging dichotomy has been set up by a culture that has seemingly lost all concept of appropriate sexual boundaries. We can discuss at length the proclivities of a photogenic teen we'll never meet, while still unable to tell our partner that we don't like the way they perform oral sex. The former demeans us all, making desire a nonsense or a competition. How we execute the latter requires a humanity that is nowadays utterly excised from our public reading of sexuality.

This is not a call for a return to a puritan past where sex was had and not heard. But there must be a way to repress the junk succour of public sex while freeing private appetites. It is only by translating the putative sexual freedom of our full-frontal society into our private lives that we wrest back control of sex, its meaning and its language from the advertisers. In a world where it often feels like every experience has been flayed of flavour through overexposure, sex is one of the few things that retains its tang. To desire and be desired can be many things: funny, awkward, transformative, sacred and profane. To be honest in that moment demands a particularly intimate bravery. But we won't come to it through the pages of Heat.

Modern times have brought a new form of restriction, through a culture that debases one of the most truthful ways two human beings can relate. Only by reclaiming sex for our private selves can we come to a better understanding of the potential of desire, it's ability to take us to the heart of our greatest fear: that we might be anybody or anything.

[Kappa]

LenochkaO, I adore the way you think!

Yes, in many senses this article is very right. Is it okay to discuss the neighbour's sexuality or manner of having sex, sexual life, etc, without being able to express our own sexuality to our partners?

It might have to do with the last line of my signature (aka Very Proud Perverted Youngster of the Forum :P) but I was born in a generation that continuously realizes sex is not the bad thing our parents taught us it was. Sexuality, sex itself, and most of the subjects coming along with it are a matter of daily discussion between people my age and their partners (I add myself in this category) because what being perverted in the past is being healthy in the present. That's why in so many ways I'm damn proud of what tATu has done, and not so much care about WHAT they DO in bed (knowing IF they do so wouldn't be bad, thought, but that's another topic :P): they have shown a grown-up society what sex signifies to youngsters nowadays. I'm pretty much sure that sex is the same to me as it is for Lena or for Yulia.

*sniggers* I mean, do we see them worrying about not being virgins anymore? Phfй, come on. Only Britney could have worried about that kind of an item: claiming virginity and wearing something that reveals the color of your panties does not make sense.

I am maybe going off topic here, but I would say that it is an older generation that has missed the importance of communication when it comes to sexual relationships. It's far from not happening again, but I seem to remember that a thousand mile journey starts with one step.

[nath]

Sex is nothing without head, feelings...I speak for me ...
So if you really love somebody, you feel if something is wrong with him...
In this case , unperceivable small gestures, small expressions are better warning than words..the words always leave traces , have consequences...a kiss can tell you much more than long sentences...
Love is a strange receipt of kitchen ...if you want it lives for a long time you have to make the balance between that you can say and that you must keep for you...

If you have problems it's a good thing to speak about them to resolve them...but if you know the people you love...you don't need too much words....you can read in the eyes...you can read in the voice...you can read in the hands, in the fingers...
All your body, all your words can lie....but a kiss never lies if you're attentive...

I really love to speak but....when you give, offer your body to someone ..it's like a part of your soul that you offer....it can be magic, and transform you: full of force ...but , both, it's weakening ...

So, I think it is necessary to pay great attention so that one says ....be confortable with your lover ..of course...but to pay great attention so that one says ....

...and love shared.. built... with the bodies..must, too, keep a secret garden , keep it's mystery..for me...: you know..but you don't say...

I'm for the communication...but too many words KILL..for me..

It's just my own opinion..

[PowerPuff Grrl]

This is not a call for a return to a puritan past where sex was had and not heard. But there must be a way to repress the junk succour of public sex while freeing private appetites. It is only by translating the putative sexual freedom of our full-frontal society into our private lives that we wrest back control of sex, its meaning and its language from the advertisers.

I cannot imagine a world where the saturation of sex in the media is dimished.
It's almost like the writer of the article is asking for the media take take some accountability for this and quite frankly I have to say that's bullshit. Everything you see in the public regarding sex directly mirrors the attitude of the society it is in. Yes the mirror may distort this attitude to an extent but nonetheless the general notion stems from the society.

I totally disagree with the writers notion of the tail wagging the dog; the media dictating the ideologies of sex onto the people (politics maybe). It is so typical of people pointing the fingers to Marketing, yes what they are doing is perpetuating the idea that sex is a joke but that is what they are suppose to do. If the people feel sex is a joke then Marketers will market it as such otherwise they lose money. It is very cowardly but they are not obligated to educate.

The problem has to do with society and the only way to solve this problem is to go to schools and actually have children be educated on sex, discuss it in the living room with the family, and hell even in religious institutions. Then will you have future generations of children growing up and telling their partners how they feel and where their G-spot really is.

Reducing the exploitation of sex in the media won't enlightened us uptight beings, it will only make for a very Puritan society. Moreover, advertisers, filmakers, musicians, etc will find ways to have sex featured in extremely subtle ways like they did in the 50s, watch the documentary the Celluliod Closet, I highly reccomend it.

LenochkaO, thanks for the article, it was a good read!

[jockdstylez]

Hmm.. I honestly don't feel this article applies to me nor my generation. My generation's lines of communication are wide open, atleast to my knowledge. This problem only relates, I presume to married couples or older more reserved adults.

I have never had problems in the bedroom, nor have had any complaints. And if there were problems, I would never hesitate to try and find a solution to whatever the problem may be. Or else why even have sex when you can't even enjoy it? Which is why I agree with PPG, that the problem does not lie within the media, but within the society and the individuals themselves. It's your fault that you cannot communicate with your partner, thus leaving you with an unsatisfactory sex life.

Though I can understand some reasons like the thought of hurting your partners feelings. But if they loved you (assuming they did), then ego should not come in the way. Or maybe the problem isn't only in the bedroom, your actions outside the bedroom might be sending "i dont like to comprimise" messsages to your partner, which is the probably the reason why they are reluctant to tell you. But I'm no sex expert, though I do know what I am talking about. Sex is a sacred act (not casual sex), which should be enjoyed fully not dreaded or thought of as "okay lets get this over with" ugh. What a waste, sex is the closest thing to pure ecstasy (legally) you can get (assuming you perform it correctly ) If people could just get over themselves and think of the rewards, there wouldnt be such problems.

And in my opinion, if you can't get passed your own ego to listen or try to accomodate to your partners needs, then you don't deserve to experience the wonders of "mind blowing sex" for lack of a better word, hehe


hrmm..i feel like ive completely gone off topic..

[LenochkaO]

I've been interested in sex since I was a pre-teen, and have had the necessary knowledge (not necessarily practical - that's been acquired over the years ) and vocabulary since then (thanks Cosmopolitan!). However, it wasn't something I really felt I could discuss with friends; there's now greater openness in society than there was 10 years ago, and that can only be a good thing. I don't think that greater openness necessarily has to lead to the cheapening of sex as a freak show that we see in the tabloids, however.

I think that many people never develop a mature attitude to sex and still see it as something rather naughty and dirty, rather than as the ultimate act of trust and surrendering of the self between two people. Sex is something that should be cherished. But not idealised - we have to realise that it's somewhat like eating (stop sniggering at the back, there! I know what you're thinking, and it's not big, and it's not clever! )

(I'm sure this metaphor's been done to death, but what the hell!) By eating, I mean that sometimes one wants to eat alone or quickly, sometimes one wants an intimate dinner a deux, and sometimes one wants to go to a banquet with a variety of courses (large number of guests optional )

I haven't read The Bride Stripped Bare, but this is an article (again from the Guardian) written by the book's author. http://www.guardian.co.uk/women/stor...994962,00.html
And here are the responses it generated
http://www.guardian.co.uk/women/stor...999558,00.html

I've also just read a book called The Good Women of China, by an author known as Xinran. It's a pretty good portrait of a country in which there was no openness about sex at all for decades. Somewhat depressing in terms of how vile people can be to each other, but I'd recommend it as a Wild Swans for the 21st century (only shorter and less of a heavy read ).

[Kappa]

LenochkaO, then again, if you weren't as open as I think you are, you would not be in tatysite.net, which is a tatu discussion forum, which is a group whose lyrics are directed to a sexually open public, whose minds are supposed to be wide open.

[LenochkaO]

Originally posted by darje
LenochkaO, then again, if you weren't as open as I think you are, you would not be in tatysite.net, which is a tatu discussion forum, which is a group whose lyrics are directed to a sexually open public, whose minds are supposed to be wide open.

I agree totally, Darje
I sometimes wonder whether I would have liked Tatu when I was 14 (if we don't follow the line that Tatu's the product of the commercialisation of sexuality over the last 10 years), and if so, whether I'd have felt happy about telling people that I do. Would I have been worried about other kids saying I was a lesbian because I was a fan? I was a heavy metal fan, but that was "OK" because some of my classmates were as well.

Actually, the fundamental question I ask myself is whether, had I been interested in girls rather than boys, I would have been open about this. I rather suspect I wouldn't have, which makes me admire the younger members on this forum who aren't afraid to be honest about their sexuality.

Anyway, I seem to have rambled off the point somewhat (what was the point again?) so on that note, I shall take myself off for my post-prandial ablutions...

[Veritas]

Of course it is a lot easier to display it in an article than to face your partner because facing them means they could feel insufficient and hurt. Which is the last thing anybody wants. But communication is vital and if you don't know what your partner likes how would you know they're enjoying it to the full potential? I'd much rather let my partner know than spend the rest of my days with an average sex-life.

[denial]

*Writes on the wall*

-Denial was here-
my sex is like ...WHOA!!

[Veritas]

Originally posted by denial
*Writes on the wall*

-Denial was here-
my sex is like ...WHOA!!

Cute...real cute

[girl_into_music]

LenochkaO, have you red books by Anais Nin? If not, I highly recommend it! She explores many sex issues. She lived very "full life"..Some of her novels are autobiographic (based on her diaries)...

[LenochkaO]

Originally posted by girl_into_music
LenochkaO, have you red books by Anais Nin? If not, I highly recommend it! She explores many sex issues. She lived very "full life"..Some of her novels are autobiographic (based on her diaries)...

Thanks for the recommendation. I've not actually read anything by her, though obviously she's famous for writing about sex. Perhaps it's time to raid Amazon again (oh God, not another horrendous credit card bill next month! )