Sexuality, Intimacy, And Intimacy Essay

From birth, one's sexuality is shaped by society. Cultures institute behaviors that are to be seen as the societal norms, which work to constantly reinforce societal expectations of how genders should act in relation to one another. Although some may argue that one's sexuality is an innate characteristic resulting from genetic makeup, there is a large amount of evidence pointing to its social construction instead. Through the power differences between males and females, established gender roles, and drastic economic shifts, society establishes sexuality and reinforces the behaviors that are expected of its citizens.

Unlike sex, the history of sexuality is dependant upon society and limited by its language in order to be defined and understood.

Shaping my sexual behavior was generally influenced by my mom. I learned to be dependent on men and use safe sex through media. Gender sex roles also placed me to be secretive with my sex life and nurturing. My body image makes me insecure when it comes to intimacy. There were no specific sexual guidelines that my family made me follow. I was raised in a family where I was able to explore and have my own opinions about sexual situations. Not having guidelines or a path made me lost and confused once I obtained sexual behaviors. My experiences from friends, my mom, religion, and media influenced the development of my sexuality.

Each day, over one-hundred and eighteen million babies are born worldwide. According to the biological sex binary male and female, every infant has the possibility of being born with sex chromosomes female (XX) and male (XY), which causes differences in their biological anatomies. There are also individuals with disorders of sex development or more commonly referred to as being intersex. Intersex is an umbrella term for people whose sexual or reproductive anatomies, sex hormones, or sex chromosomes just do not fall neatly into the definitions of male and female. Examples of this disorder could include ambiguous genitalia, androgen sensitivity, or abnormalities with how the rest of the body responds to sex hormones. The majority of cultures around the globe give merit to and recognize the differences in biological sex (male/female binary), what roles they have played in their traditions/histories, and their current position in framing politics or societal structures. Some Non-Western countries such as China, India, Taiwan, and Pakistan, include cultures that exhibit a strong sex-preference, or more specifically son-preference. More than simply preferring the births of sons to daughters, son preference develops from instances of gender inequality where outside parties often question basic human rights. Non-Western

This paper will outline sexuality at different life stages, and as a sexual therapist I will coach an adolescent girl with a boyfriend who is pressuring her to have sex; an elderly couple with a wife exhibiting a renewed interest in sexual activity and a unwilling husband; and finally a handicapped male that has been paralyzed since he was four years old.

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.

In today’s society things are being expressed and experienced at younger ages, than ever before in our time. Children and teenagers are discovering their sexuality at very early ages. Sexuality is the discovering of who you are and what makes you different from everybody else.

Throughout history, definitions of sexuality within a culture are created and then changed time after time. During these changes, we have seen the impact and power one individual or group can have over others. In the Late Nineteenth Century into the Early Twentieth Century, we see multiple groups of people and or authorities taking control over the idea of sex and how they believe society is being impacted by sex. At this point in time, society had groups of people who believed they had the power to control how society as whole viewed and acted upon sex. Those particular groups and ideas changed many lives and the overall definition of sexuality within that culture.

"A man who kissed or embraced an intimate male friend in bed did not worry about homosexual impulses because he did not assume that he had them. In the Victorian language of touch, a kiss or an embrace was a pure gesture of deep affection at least as much as it was an act of sexual expression,"

Just as other interpersonal themes, sexual themes in film are often depictions of sexual themes that exist in real life relationships. For this very reason, it is very easy for a person to compare his relationships with that of a relationship shown in media or film. Some relationships are total train wrecks from the start while others are not necessarily ideal, but healthy. Although not seen very often, ideal couples in film are attributed with characteristics that are seen by society as desirable; youthful, attractive people who are hyper-sexual and affectionate. As cliché as it sounds, sometimes relationships are simply “complicated”. Such is the case in the film It’s Complicated.

The role of the orgasm in heterosexual relationships is significant in having a satisfying malefemale relationship according to society’s expectations. By using the malefemale binary, as well as exploring the social construction of sex, we can see just how significant the role the orgasm plays in heterosexual relationships. First off, we must understand that orgasms are achieved differently for both males and females.

Tearoom Trade: the use of a public restroom as a place where men of all varieties go to engage in homosexual activity. By engaging in such activity they must accept costs and risks of this behaviour, however will receive a significant reward. As explained in Humphreys book, men involved in the tearoom game, use these facilities because of the social process that is structured to allow him to have a sexual encounter without any outside personal involvement with other participants. With the many rules in Tearooms, men find them much more attractive as it provides a certain protection against his social image, as this type of behaviour can be seen as very inappropriate and rather illegal. The Tearoom Trade as a sexual deviant activity.

Gender and sexuality can be comprehended through social science. Social science is “the study of human society and of individual relationships in and to society” (free dictionary, 2009). The study of social science deals with different aspects of society such as politics, economics, and the social aspects of society. Gender identity is closely interlinked with social science as it is based on an identity of an individual in the society. Sexuality is “the condition of being characterized and distinguished by sex” (free dictionary, 2009). There are different gender identities such as male, female, gay, lesbian, transgender, and bisexual that exists all around the world. There is inequality in gender identities and dominance of a male

Males and females are classed differently from the moment they are pronounced boy or girl. Gender determines the differences in power and control in which men and women have over the socioeconomic determinants of their health, lives and status in their community. Our society moulds how men and women should and should not behave and can be observed in all parts of our society. As a result of these Gender stereotypes men and women have issues which affect their health which are unique to each gender. Males for example are perceived to be greater risk takers as a whole in our society than that of females. We represent risk taking behavior with masculinity and violence, high speed driving and contact sport with the male gender. (Doyle 2005)

When considering gender and sex, a layman’s idea of these terms might be very different than a sociologist’s. There is an important distinction: sex, in terms of being “male” or “female,” is purely the physical biological characteristic differences – primarily anatomical differences. (There are also rare cases of “intersexual” individuals as outlined in the Navarro article, “When Gender Isn’t a Given”.) Gender, on the other hand, is an often misconstrued concept that is commonly mistaken as synonymous with sex. A non-sociologist might surmise the following, “men act masculine and women act feminine, therefore, it must follow that gender is inherent to sex,” however, this is not necessarily the case.