Essay On Hook Up Culture

Since the dawn of man, sex has played a crucial role in society. Before they learned to read or write humans were engaging in sex and without it none of us would be here. In today’s society, sex has grown to become much more complicated. If I were to ask a group of people on the street what they believed sex was? I bet they would have a hard time answering. The question puzzling society today is how do we define sex? Can we define sex? These are questions raised in Tracy Steele’s article “Doing it: The Social Construction of S-E-X”. This article is about the current questions and issues that have been raised about sex within today’s society. In this paper I will summarize the key points of the article, while sharing my own thoughts and

Theodore Dalrymple, in the essay “All Sex, All the Time” reflects on the change of view of the people about sex and how it has lead people into more confusion and conflict than before. Dalrymple’s real name being Anthony Daniels, he picked up the pseudonym of Theodore Dalrymple for the purpose of his essays. There were times when virginity was a pride to men and women. However, it still prevails in some countries, this custom and the people have been changing. He states that the world is now free to enjoy sexual pleasures without any fear of the myths and taboos that existed in history. Although people feel that they are satisfied and are free to choose this path of life, sex has lead people into “confusion, contradiction, and conflict” states Dalrymple (Dalrymple 1).

It is midnight at the last party I ever went to because I turned down a one-night stand with Rebecca from math class: Does this sound like you? Many college students seem to believe this to be a true statement. What if you just were not that type of person? Donna Freitas wrote, “Time to stop hooking up. (You know you want to.)”, published in 2013 with The Washington Post. Donna concludes, most students in college would rather go on a date than have one-night stands but fear their social status may be called into question. Donna begins to build her credibility with experience in hookup culture, quantifiable surveys conducted by

Free-and-easy sex prides itself on being commitment free, no emotional ties attached. Today, this idea of leaving all emotions at the door is the supposedly, sophisticated choice on campus. It is now well understood that traditional dating in college has mostly gone the way of the landline, replaced by “hooking up”- an ambiguous term that can signify anything from making out to oral sex to intercourse - all complete without the emotional entanglement of a real relationship. As times have changed, students begin to view a relationship as “too time consuming” and something that no longer takes priority amongst their busy, high achieving schedules. However, hooking up threatens the sexual, physical, and psychological health of college-age youth. Today’s youth may want to think twice before engaging in the prevalent hook-up culture. Despite the popularity of positive feelings, hookups can include negative outcomes including emotional and psychological injury, and even more concerning consequences such as unintended rape. In order to protect our generation, and more specifically our women, society must acknowledge the detrimental effects of a hook up culture to create a greater understanding surrounding this risky sexual behavior and ensure a more powerful, positive presence for women in our society. The combination of a society seeped in rape culture and an alcohol infused hookup culture creates a compromising sexual environment where women have limited control, opening the

In his essay, “Sexism in Practice: Feminist Ethics Evaluating the Hookup Culture,” Conor Kelly argues that the hook up culture prevalent in today’s society is sexist towards females. He argues that this culture gives off the illusion of freedom, but it instead disempowers women. Kelly begins by giving the definition of hook up culture. He defines it as, “the practice of pursuing sexual activity without any expectation of a relationship.” He then states what he believes are the four main factors that contribute to the disempowerment brought on by this culture: a lack of commitment, use of ambiguous language, alcohol use, and a social pressure to conform. Kelly then gives his argument as to why hookup culture should be concerning.

Ira L. Reiss, a well-known sociologist, has contributed greatly to the field of human sexuality and in the 1960’s brilliantly predicted the revolutionary changes in sexual attitudes. In his novel, An End to Shame: Shaping Our Next Sexual Revolution, Reiss develops the notion that our previous sexual revolution did not adequately eliminate the inequalities related to sexuality. In reality he argues that America is in need of a newly formed sexual revolution, one that will address the negative consequences that our sex negative culture is experiencing. A significant portion of our population argues that these consequences are due to the fact that we talk too much and too soon about sex. This is an inaccurate view of the reasoning behind the sexual problems we are experiencing in America, as in reality the negative sexual outcomes we observe are due to the opposite of this view. This misconception is a common explanation for our sexual problems and many believe it is the key to solving our sexual crisis, but in reality is part of the problem. Reiss argues that “America is long overdue for a rendezvous with sexual reality” (18) and that the future of our nation depends on accepting these realities.

An extremely interesting, but ever-contradictory sociological study of sexual relationsis presented in the Kathy Peiss book Cheap Amusements . The reason I say that it is ever-contradictory is that the arguments are presented for both the benefit of cheap amusements for a woman s place in society and for the reinforcement of her place. In one breath, Peiss says that mixed-sex fun could be a source of autonomy and pleasure as well as a cause of [a woman s] continuing oppression. The following arguments will show that, based on the events and circumstances described in Cheap Amusements , the changes in the

Human sexuality is a common phrase for all, and anything, pertaining to the feelings and behaviors of sex for the human race. Sexuality has been a topic that has been discussed and studied for as far back as 1000 years B.C. and is still being studied today. As the discussion of sexuality has progressed through history, theories have been created based on research and experiments that scholars have implemented, based on their own perceptions of human behavior. Out of the many theories that pose to explain sexual behavior, Sexuality Now explained ten that are seemed to be the most overlapped, and built off of theories. Of these theories, two that were discussed in the text were the behavioral and sociological theory. These two theories cover some of the basic ideas of what could possibly influence a person’s sexuality.

The article supported their claim through collecting data from the website NevaEvaLand, a popular social media page used by girls in low-income areas such as Atlanta, Georgia, to display how different sexual scripts influenced the way girls acted on the internet. Stokes found that there were five groups that most girls would label themselves a part of the, “Freaks, Virgins, Down-Ass Chick, Pimpette, and Resisters” (Stokes 124). After analyzing the five different sexual scripts, the author described the attitude each person carried towards sex and how they acted on the internet. Her reasoning for why the girls acted in the manner they did online was because they were looking for different pleasures out of sexual partners. The Freaks and Down-Ass Chicks were more promiscuous and expressed that on their homepage, while those such as Virgins were finding someone who was fine with abstaining from sex. The data collected made her reasoning effective by providing credible support to her

In the book American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus, By Lisa Wade, she addresses the issues and concerns that she sees within the “hookup culture”. Lisa Wade’s book is a mixture of important statistics and personal accounts of what happens in the hookup culture on various college campuses. To define the hookup culture that Wade is addressing, we can look to the book as Lisa defines the hookup culture as essentially casual sex with no strings attached, another sociologist Kathleen Bogle described this as a “new norm” for campuses and that this an be very harmful for women especially (Wade, 2017, p.16). Michael Kimmel a well-known sociologist of masculinity was quoted saying that hooking up is “guys-sex” and that guys run the

Hooking up has become an increasingly studied culture by many sociologists around the country. These studies have been done to understand the shift from the old culture of dating to the new culture of hooking up that we experience now. Many people find it interesting that the kids of our generation have become so sexualized and carefree compared to the college days of our parents. Many people wonder how we got to this point and how the dynamics of hookups work, and why we continue to go on with them even sometimes at cost of our mental and physical help. One of these people was Kathleen A. Bogle, who wrote an entire book on the subject called, Hooking Up: Sex, Dating, and Relationships on Campus, which is the focal point of this essay.

College and universities have made great strides over the years. The campuses have grown, and the resources have improved tremendously. However, it is questionable if that social scene on these campuses has changed for the better over the years. “Work hard, party hard” has become the motto of college students to live by. Students spend the week focused on their academics, striving to grow as intellects. However, the weekend becomes the time when students look to go out and socialize at the various parties. And this is exactly what the weekend is for. With growing causal party scenes, college students have been more inclined to have a casual relationship with the opposite sex. Traditional dating on college campuses is rarely seen anymore

Teenagers engage in casual sex to feel mature and part of a society that shapes the idea of casual sex as a liberating and empowering event. Shows like “Sex and the City” promote women who have jobs, friends, and a very active sexual life with strangers and because of this they claim to “have it all,” as the character of Samantha said in an episode. Entertainment and the media are filled with sex driven programs, commercials and books.

Due to the effects of sexuality in the media, more teens are open to sexual acts and at a younger age now. Adolescents are now open to "hook-ups" or friends-with-benefits, where they have "casual sexual encounters at parties and clubs between youngsters who are not emotionally involved with one another" which are influenced by new techology and take away the "first date" which would help put safe sex into the teens minds (Friedman). Some folks are worried that the sex in the media will counteract sex education and do not include problems that having sexual intercourse can bring about. In his article "Sex, Violence and the Media", Charles S. Clark explains:

Orenstein began her quest for an honest account of today’s hook-up culture as her daughter approached adolescence. Prior to this point in her life, she had only heard from friends about how teenage girls were treated in today’s culture, now she needed to know if this type of culture really did exist. Since she had been chronicling girl’s lives for over twenty-five years, it was an obvious place to start (Orenstein, P., 2016). She interviewed girls, psychologists, sociologists, pediatricians, educators, and journalist to uncover the ugly truth.