Sexual Shame

[Chad32]

As far as dick size goes, I'm pretty sure most women wouldn't want a huge dick in them. There's only so much space in a vagina, after all. They're not one size fits all elastic fun holes.

You know, those things are designed for a baby to come out of. I think if a human baby can fit though a vagina without too much difficulty, the great majority of penises will fit, too. I don't know if 'too large' is a legitimate concern.

Don't a lot of pregnancies involve tearing. Women don't usually pump out babies on a nightly or weekly basis either. Though I could be totally wrong. I am a guy, after all.

[Minimalist]

I would rather my 3 year old son see nudity and sexuality than violence.

And people think that is weird.

Yeah, people tend to get it backwards. Driving a sword through someone? PG13. Topless woman? Rated R. Then of course there's the double standard between hetero kissing and homo kissing.

I bet there is some fucking church involved in that distinction!

[No_God]

I don't like hearing that women don't like the way their vulva looks. They are all so different and beautiful. Variety is everything in life. I'm a promoter of vulva love and an advocate for eradicating period shame. Love yo'selves!

[frankiej]

I'm a promoter of vulva love and an advocate for eradicating period shame. Love yo'selves!

I was about to say that "Sexual Shame" is the name of my new album, but I think you have stumbled upon a true gem... "Vulva Love". Definitely on to a chart topper there.

[Cinjin]

Weird. As I see his photo, a part of me, one that hasn't finished healing, still feels guilty about bashing him. I respected him so much back then.

Really?!?

Allow me to help you remember what kind of a douche bag this asshat is ...

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The men who wrote the bible hated women. They were less than livestock to them. The entire book is extremely patriarchal and stinks of "sand man has tiny penis and does not like it when women enjoy sex." Needless to say, douche bags, like that pastor, have no problem buying into this concept and though they would NEVER admit it, they share the exact same values.

Your "sin" was not committed against that congregation. God is the only one that supposedly needed to forgive you. The only reason you were made to do that was so that he could humiliate you. What's more, since NONE of those parishioners had the power to forgive you, the only thing they likely got out of it was sexual titillation. Oh, and the head-job he did on you is still working today. Fuck that immoral piece of garbage. I'd put his name on that fucking picture if I knew who it was.

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self-righteous dirtbag

[SteelCurtain]

[Tonus]

Anyway, I was thinking: Is this a religious idea, or something that pre-dated religion/ is part of human nature? Obviously you've got the Adam and Eve story, so whoever wrote that must have already had the idea of sexual shame.

Clothes probably were developed long before religious nuts became obsessed with controlling everyone's sex life. Or at least that makes sense to me, since clothes had other benefits (at least for those who were living in less temperate climes).

[youtube]E4HGfagANiQ[/youtube]

[Angrboda]

Anyway, I was thinking: Is this a religious idea, or something that pre-dated religion/ is part of human nature? Obviously you've got the Adam and Eve story, so whoever wrote that must have already had the idea of sexual shame.

Clothes probably were developed long before religious nuts became obsessed with controlling everyone's sex life. Or at least that makes sense to me, since clothes had other benefits (at least for those who were living in less temperate climes).

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[youtube]E4HGfagANiQ[/youtube]

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An excellent response. I was going to point out that modesty and sexual shame are likely evolved psychological responses to biological and social challenges, but you beat me to it.

A few additional points.

First, such reactions are strong and tend to veto whatever response our conscious brain would, perhaps, like us to feel, if we didn't have this intrusive mental event preventing our conscious brain center from shrugging it off as senseless prudery. This intrusiveness and other aspects suggest that the response isn't something we designed and teach to our children, something we invented out of whole cloth as it were, but something we were born with.

Along those lines, it's axiomatic that we have sexual responses to body parts that figure in sexual reproduction. Our brains come preloaded to have reactions to pubic triangles, breasts, nipples, cocks, hip shape, buttockses, and other body parts that are either directly relevant to the reproductive drives, because they are directly involved in sex, or are proxy markers for things like fecundity and sexual availability. We have strong responses to nudity of these parts because having strong reactions to them plays a key role in ensuring the successful passing on of our genes through sex and reproduction. No patriarchal father sat down on a rock and made a list of what parts we'd react strongly to seeing; nature did that.

Along those lines, it's important to note that these reactions are muted in contexts where sexual reproduction is not an issue. Nudity of children below puberty is not considered as important a taboo as nudity of adults or adolescents, and vice versa, nudity of a parent in front of a pre-pubescent child is not considered as significant as nudity of a sexually active other in front of the same child. So it isn't just nudity which is at issue in these reactions, it's sexuality and availability as well.

And my final point is that it isn't at all unexpected that the rules should be broken down according to sex as each sex faces different practical results from the same behaviors, so the taboos on each sex are going to be different. The consequences of a woman being promiscuous with men is radically different from the consequences of a man being promiscuous with women, and those consequences are again different from those of a woman who is promiscuous with other women. The rules of the social game of reproduction and sex are different for the different players, because the mechanics of how each sex plays the game are different. Under no variant of the game does a man end up carrying a baby for 9 months, so why would it make sense for his rules and taboos to be the same as those of a woman? It wouldn't, and so they don't. (And this speaks to Ivy's example, which, admittedly, revolts me, but likely has an explanation that lies outside of blaming the behavior on a strictly religious impulse. Tribes that aren't held together by religious beliefs have similar rituals of shaming and shunning, for reasons likely having nothing to do with any "made-up" double standard.)

[Jackalope]

All I can say is this - if anyone has a problem with what I do in bed.... Don't watch.

[Tripwire]

A lot of people are very ashamed about having genitalia. It is considered offensive to be naked in public.

The reason I got thinking about this was a documentary on TV about a naked rambler here in the UK. He was walking in front a school and (not for the first time) was reported by a mother and arrested and put in prison. According to the mother being naked in front of a child is harmful ,even when it is clearly not in any way sexual. I thought this was total rubbish, how can a child possibly be damaged by seeing just a naked man walking past. How is this different to a biology class? Or am I wrong, is it harmful? I'm sure I saw my parents naked when I was little and my parents thought nothing of it, but they would have had a completely different reaction if it had been another adult.

I think the reasoning is that nakedness is automatically associated with sex. However I don't think a child would be thinking about this, just the parent. Young children often show each other their bits in the playground (so I've been told), completely unaware of any connotations other that "you are different to me, that's interesting".

Anyway, I was thinking: Is this a religious idea, or something that pre-dated religion/ is part of human nature? Obviously you've got the Adam and Eve story, so whoever wrote that must have already had the idea of sexual shame.

Religion. The first humans had no reason to be ashamed. I myself am not shamed, as I'm good looking and an atheist.