Sex Positive

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I can relate to Christina Ricci in Black Snake Moan as well. Her biggest problem was the type of men she was around, and whom she assumed would reason with her point of view and attitude. When they never did, she played the role that the men created for her, small town whore. However, she did have a problem with infidelity, and that doesn't sound like you or I.[/quote] -How do you know if it doesn't sound like me, you know little about me and Her biggest problem being the type of men she was around. Her boyfriend was a nice guy and it was her moms partner that was the problem more so than the men she was around. True men created her that role of being a whore. She really wasn't.

-How do you know if it doesn't sound like me, you know little about me and Her biggest problem being the type of men she was around. Her boyfriend was a nice guy and it was her moms partner that was the problem more so than the men she was around. True men created her that role of being a whore. She really wasn't.[/quote]

I'm unsure about what you are saying here.

I'm on a phone line so I don't do You-tube. So I looked it up on Wikipedia. They don't mention Berkowitz and I'm still not really clear about how it compares to my pov.

For me, sexuality is something that comes from inside, and healthy sexuality expresses that, without hurting anyone else, and ideally with the goal of not putting psychological health at risk by doing anything too risky.

But my impression of sex positive is that a lot of the time it is a concept used relativistically, and I can't stand relativism. Sure, a lot of the time different points of view are equally valid. But there's still such thing as right and wrong, since some practices actually hurt people, and I don't think some people can do both ethics and authenticity at the same time yet, so when they choose relativism, they selectively ignore an objective look at ethics. Though ultimately, I think ethics and authenticity have to go together in order for them to both work, since I think ethics, properly applied, protects authenticity for everyone involved.

I wouldn't discourage anyone from going backcountry skiing, even though I wouldn't go myself, and even though avalanche risk is high right now. But I'd encourage them to become properly informed of the risks before they go. I think it's the same thing for sex: you do it because you want to, not because other people tell you you should want to. And you make sure you know what you're getting into as much as possible, to maximize the positives. I'm probably repeating myself.

Here is a link to an interview with the director of the movie. There is a brief description on Berkowitz's attempt to publicly advocate safe sex, and more information about his book, Stayin' Alive: The Invention of Safe Sex, which he wrote in hindsight regarding the first wave of the AIDS epidemic. Most of this interview is silly banter about making a movie, but you can find the book on Amazon for less than $2. I'm getting a copy.

I have to admit that I feel really stupid since I have always just assumed that the majority of all sex was positive since I've not ben involved with any that was bad, so thought bad sex was rare. That isn't to mean that I don't understand how bad, bad sex (abusive or forced) can be for people or the impact it can have on their lives.
I don't think of myself as being any particular type of sexual person since I actually can't imagine what it would be like to have what people call a sexual identity or a sexual preference so maybe I can't say to much about any of this.

I'll respond realistically. Sex does more harm than good.

I pretty much figured that being a man I could not see the whole picture but still don't believe that sex is a predominantly bad thing.

Well... maybe this point was overlooked, maybe not... but I mentioned at the end of my 2nd post that the sexual mores of every culture are perceived as hurtful by the people who live with them... (note the relationship to mixtapebooty's above comment here)

Which puts a wrinkle in the notion of sexual ethics as "doing no harm".

And while yes, you want to be able to get some kind of objective-esque view of how to better help people to experience sex in a positive way that produces a lasting and positive emotional response to it (instead of the kind of PTSD experience I've had), it's just not realistic to think that we have the ability to do that yet... I mean... not that there haven't been strides in that direction, but we're far far far from being able to even study sex objectively. Because of the very strong emotions people feel about it in general, the subject simply defies objective study.

So what we're left with for the moment is an awful lot of guessing about what may or may not hurt various different people and knowing full well that we can't get a straight answer, because any given practice is perceived as a source of harm the minute it becomes wide-spread in a target culture. So we look at some large population where x practice is perceived as hurtful. So we go and we look for some alternative practice and we find some area where a small population of people have an alternative that seems to work well for them and we start promoting that as a "healthy alternative". And then we manage to get this alternative to be wide-spread and we discover that (tada!) The new "healthy alternative" is hurting people. Why? Because it became wide-spread... and the minute that happens, people start experiencing pain from it.

It seems to be rather like a given generation rebelling against their parents' generation and the associated history of counter-culture movements... Which leads me to thinking that a large part of the problem may simply lie in our inability to a) accept that our information about sex is not very good (or objective, as we always seem to think we KNOW EXACTLY(tm) what is good and bad for people) and b) create a cultural framework in which sexual practice is not rigidly controlled in one way or another. Perhaps if we were able to create a cultural framework in which we weren't so demanding of conformity (not to mention litigious) about sex, we might discover that such a cultural environment is perceived as non-hurtful. But as of yet we seem unable to do that.

And it seems to me personally at least that traditional notions of ethics simply fall straight back into that paradigm of "we know what's good for you", and so rather than helping to foster an environment in which there is actually less harm done, would merely continue to reinforce a kind of see-saw between practices that all hurt people but in different ways. (Re: mixtapebooty's comment that sex does more harm than good.)

Note that I'm not saying that ethics is bad. Just that traditional ethics doesn't seem to have gotten us any closer to resolving the issue of better sex practices. And so if traditional ethics aren't helping to resolve this problem, maybe we need to rethink our model of ethics in this context.

I agree that it is an attitude problem at large. I tend to think that everyone has a really messed up attitude about sex. My problem is that I want to believe that people are capable of really holding themselves accountable for the beliefs that they project, when the fact is, that most everyone is idealistic about sex- from chaste nuns, married couples, to sex workers in the most dire straits.

I keep wanting to hold on to this last guy that I tried to cope with letting into my life, but he's rejecting me to go out with all his many friends all the time. I barely have anyone to even talk to, and he judges me based on that as well. He sort of thinks that Asperger's is like a dumb joke I made up or something. He keeps telling me that I'm out of my mind. I just wanted to have some fun sex on a regular basis, but to him that's like once a month I guess, and that's not enough for me. That's like stringing me along with enough time to verbally abuse me in between hook ups.

Since this doesn't seem to be progressing I guess that most people agree that sex is largely a negative thing. I still think that's very strange.

Well I'm actually not really laying claim to the "most" idea.

The idea I'm laying claim to is "i'm not sure... and I'm not convinced by anyone who says they're sure".

I know that I personally have had both very negative and very positive experiences with sex... most have been some combination rather than an extreme. But I can't really extrapolate that to anyone else, even though I perceive that a lot of people have had similarly painful experiences thrust upon them by overtly repressive cultures.

Yeah that blows... and not in a good way... he sounds like a loser, you should find someone cooler than that.

I like sex, personally. I think it is largely abused, and that is all I wanted to imply. Sex can be great, and is great if and when the circumstances are right, but how often does that really happen, considering the dense population? We're talking about a few billion unplanned pregnancies on Earth.

I've had painful experiences thrust upon me (no pun intended) by overly permissive cultures. As in "you can do whatever you want so long as no one sends you to jail. If they don't send you to jail it must not be hurting anybody, right?"

I think sex works better if you develop a relationship of trust, first. Then you can both negotiate what you want/need in a safe space.

I'm right in between you two with a mix of both experiences. I've been afflicted for some time now, by the experience of permissiveness in a society that does try to get away with anything and everything that it can get away with, regardless of the ethic behind the action. I've also dealt with attempted oppression of myself in a multitude of ways from many different people. I feel a good counterbalance is necessary to be logical about sex, and attempting sex with someone. The most important feature of a relationship involving sex is character, in my opinion. That's why I like to explore role play.

Those of us on the spectrum are the absolute best observers of life but sometimes not the best participants in it.
This took me a long time to understand.