CHAPTER VI

Sex and Sexuality

Much of the information that follows is very different from what we typically learn and are conditioned to believe about sex and sexuality. My thirty-five years (to this date) of counseling others (as well as myself) has taught me a great deal about our lives.

The Psycho/Social Background

In society, from the distant past and to the present, much of our social behavior reflects the hierarchical and oppressive organization that has evolved alongside human development.

The social system in human society is driven by the kind of power relationships that play out between human beings. This system is characterized by stereotyped class, race, economic, gender, age and other distinctions.

There is a direct correlation between the exercise of unfair power on one hand and the amount of human suffering on the other.

Who we are as groups and individuals, what is expected of us, how we are expected to behave and perform, what we are supposed to have and not have, what quality of life we are entitled to have or not have, are all conditioned perceptions and social patterns developed and perpetuated over time by the oppressive system.

This conditioning is oppressive because the sharing of power is unfairly distributed, based on the cultural stereotypes as they are. The stereotypes and class distinctions, and resulting social behaviors, are so ancient, so pervasive and so ingrained in our human psyches and that only in recent times have we widely begun to question their validity.

The eras of the, renaissance, enlightenment, the revolutions in America, France (indeed all the revolutions against unjust regimes), the abolition of slavery, the struggle for women’s rights, civil rights and racial equality are all examples of the questioning of the ancient system of the status quo.

The oppressive social system is structured, in basic terms, along class lines: the top of the heap, the “elite,” is supposed to have and own everything, ordained (often by “divine decree”) to be better, smarter, more beautiful and more deserving than everyone else. Next comes the administrative class which acts as agents for the elite, then the middle class (having evolved most recently) who function in the upper labor, professional, intellectual and creative arenas; the lower working class who provide raw labor. The last strata on the ladder are the poor and utterly deprived who serve as the dumping ground for all above. They are that part of humanity that the restricted, reserved and controlled wealth is not permitted to reach, and who are set up as scapegoats for everyone above.

Every new human born and raised in society is socialized to internalize this system and to play out his’r (“his or her,” and him”r for ‘him or her”) respective role his’r social station imposes. This is done to dull our individual awareness, to the detriment and damage of our full sense of self worth and our human entitlement. These last accounts for why the great majority colludes with the system and can be controlled (through coercion, propaganda and emotional manipulation) by the power strata of the system.

Most people are conditioned to then dump their frustrations and angers on those below them on the social ladder: the younger or weaker ones, the darker ones, the different ones. Many people resist such ingrained urges. Among these are the ones who spearhead social consciousness and change.

What the system can’t account for is the evolving human capabilities of awareness and intuition, thus the concepts of justice and morality. These qualities have led people to question and rebel against the system; to effect social change.

The “elite” ruling class has had always to make concessions to the rest in order to hang on to power and continue to control most of the wealth. Examples of such are the Magna Charta, the American Constitution and the Bill of Rights, the overthrow of colonial powers, the struggle by workers to unionize and demand more decent working conditions, the struggle for racial equality, children’s and women’s rights, and civil rights.

As implied, every human is infected with such oppressive and distressing ideation, perceptions and behaviors due to the generational pattern of conditioning. Families act as cells for such conditioning; each new child is exposed to the habitual and thoughtless pattern of such socialization.

Let it be hastily stated that no one alive is at fault for this oppressive habit. (Every thinking person is, however, responsible to heal and end the oppression) The pattern is ancient and generationally reintroduced. The pattern stems from what I call the instinctual (as opposed to intuitional) old brain functioning evident in the social behavior (the alpha male having priority over the group) of our animal cousins, from which we have not yet fully evolved.

We often continue to act out of instinct: patterns of reactive fear, “fight or flight”, and domination (in order to secure control over resources to insure survival for one’s own kind, one’s genetic line).

The oppressive system, with its political, social, religious and cultural rules and regulations, grew out of old survival instinct, of course shaped by our sophisticated and complex intellectual capabilities.

Survival by instinct is elegantly fit for old brain animals, but it does not serve humankind well. The human mind is endowed with awareness and intuition, and thus is not content to blindly concede greater power and quality of worth to any other.

Even though conditioned to internalize the habit patterns and perspective of the oppressive system, there is hardly a human being who does not sense “there is something wrong” in the order of things, and who does not feel the psycho/-emotional pain of that “wrongness.”

Out of the growing awareness, and faced with the old pattern of lack of real attentive listening and respect, humans are motivated to protest and rebel against the oppressive conditions.

The Family Aspect

The personal rebellion that is rampant in human families is clearly seen in the conflicts between adults, between adults and children, in children’s “acting out,’ in teen age rebellion, in drug use and out of wedlock pregnancy and many other forms of rebellion. The destructive aspects of the rebellion are due to the lack of sufficient parental attention and listening, which results in internalized invalidation, anger and rage turned in against oneself, and others as well.

This shines light on the absurdity of forcing children to inform their parents if they are pregnant and considering abortion, since most probably it is parental abuse (emotional or otherwise) that has shoved the child to seek love and acceptance elsewhere (and here sex plays a huge role) – the child is sure to receive further abuse at the news. One solution: serious, committed family therapy)

What has all this to do with how we humans behave sexually?

Everything. How we act out our sexuality and sexual relations is a direct function of how we are conditioned to behave as males and females.

Male Conditioning

There are individual exceptions but by and large males are conditioned in the flowing ways: boys (and ultimately men) are socialized to be ‘tough,” to hold in feelings, to be best or beat their male rivals in everything: sexual conquest, sports, in acquisition of wealth and things, in display of “success,” ultimately in fighting and war.

Ironically, males are conditioned to look to their fellows and rivals for approval and reinforcement of their “successes” and the notches in their belts. They are shaped to revel in their bragging rights, or to walk away crest- fallen in disgrace and shame if they “fail’ the mark, or come in second. Witness the pathological, brain washing drill “winning is everything – it is the only thing” delivered by coaches, parents, political and business leaders, all the agents of the power status quo.

What this leads to is the internalization of false worth in the male ego, his sense of worth and acceptance. His sense of self worth is connected to his degree of success, conquest and his ability to play out the socialized male role.

(The deep fear we call homophobia derives from this conditioned role: anything outside of the parameters of the male role must mean that he is not a “man,” but a “sissy, a queer, a fag” – thus the huge antidiscrimination and persecution of homosexuals in present society)

Because he is unconsciously (and sometimes consciously) preoccupied by this internalized male role, and worth connected pattern of tension, when he is engaged in the pursuit of sex, and during sex, he is really not aware of the targeted person’s full self and value as a unique, feeling, thoughtful, needful and complex person. She is “objectified.”

He is thus cheated out of the real rewards of intimate closeness and affection. He is also cheated out of awarely feeling and experiencing the delicious moment to moment, touch to touch, molecule to molecule immersion in her and his physical, and mental, commingling: the sensation of that wet, warm sensual oneness that sends its messages of unique joy and happiness to the brain, to the whole body, intellect and spirit of the lovers; not simply during climax, but during every infinite moment of the whole act: the courtship, the tumescence and the love making.

He is cheated out of this dimension of lasting love.

As for climax, entrapped in the male role, the typically conditioned male is so preoccupied by his “performance” and the compulsive goal of climaxing that he cannot experience these scrumptiously joyous rewards. “Performance” means for him kudos and bragging rights, and, hopefully, admiration from his partner. Climaxing for him unconsciously means that he has fulfilled his ultimate job in perpetuating his genetic line.

Thus for him successful sex is equated with self worth. But this basis of worth is risky and fleeting. Notice the terrible distress and worry surrounding the performance and the climax. Notice the “shame” resulting from not performing and climaxing like the stud bull he supposed to be. This is wide spread in society. Whole industries have grown from this distress in the medical and sexual aids and toys fields, to name just two.

Even in the case of successful performance (and female validation) and climaxing, the sense of worth is short lived. It must always be reaffirmed and thus he is forever preoccupied by the prospect and pursuit of the next episode and opportunity for sex.

The money machines of the media and generally of business (even tires are often advertised with a beautiful, sexy woman fingering the cold, patently unsexy runner tire) are universally engaged in seeking profit from perpetuating the sexual fantasies and compulsions of males, and often females as well.

For many males sex, even the idea of sex, is not joyous, but is a tension and distress filled thing. He must forever pursue the feeling of self worth, and forever worry hurtfully about the prospect of not achieving it.

Capturing and conquering targets of his sexual desires is an act of trying to validate his self worth, of pursuing evidence of being valued and accepted.

Female Conditioning

In society the typical conditioning of females is a counterpart of male conditioning. She is supposed to be soft and sensitive, physically weak, emotional and intelligent in the ways of compassion and in making the world comfortable and safe for her men and families. She is supposed to be the nurturer and the breeder for her man. She is supposed to have no independent value but in association and as a partner to her man. She is seen as deficient if she has no man on her arm.

Her self worth, like that of her male counterpart, is based on the degree that she is successful in fulfilling this conditioned service role.

In her sexual performance she is supposed to be “the best lay” a man could desire. Her climaxing is partly motivated by the urgent need to please her partner and to win her partner’s adulation. Unjustly and painfully she is so assaulted by her conditioned need for this acceptance that often she “fakes” climaxing, thus perpetuating her emotional pain.

Thus her sense of self worth and her feeling of protection and safety in the world are dependent on his validation and, hopefully, his commitment to her.

Like the male, she is also preoccupied unconsciously with the demands of her role conditioning. She too, then, is cheated out of the serious and joyous rewards of sexual closeness. She too is cheated out of the added dimensions of affection, communication, intellectual, physical and spiritual rewards that full, real love and regard offer to humans.

She too is forever hunting that validation, acceptance, protection, and self worth that the “right man” should provide.

Thus this security is fleeting and at risk always for her, dependent as it is on the vagaries of sexual performance and conditioned role playing success. She too is forever moving through life in a bubble of unconscious worry and distress of achieving that security.

This bag of distress and tension is also fully exploited by the money machines of medicine and business. These entities are universally busy at plying and perpetuating her fantasies and needs, perpetuating the oppressive distress daily.

These conditioned roles, and the power games that are implicit in them, are responsible for the terrible and useless conflicts that exist between females and males in the oppressive system.

He is “strong, she is “weak.” He “provides,” she “nurtures.” Let her be less weak, let him be less strong, and conflicts of role expectations break out. Thus, carried to more extreme degrees these personal and interrelation conflicts result in sexual harassment, women beating, raping and other assaults, sometimes male abuse as well; in deviations and fetishes as well.

The woman’s movement, and more slowly the men’s liberation movement, offer great testimony to the evolving awareness and intelligence of human beings as they mount the ongoing revolution against the ancient status quo - social system of oppression.

Sexuality

Generally there are two aspects to human sexuality. One is the degree of allure an individual is judged to possess (in today’s culture media hype has much to do with this) The other is sexual orientation. A subset aspect of sexuality is found in the behaviors and objects of sexual expression, often seen as fetishes and deviations.

There is a certain myth concerning heterosexuality and homosexuality: that the former is normal and the latter is abnormal. Both are laden with the same kind of emotional distress and tensions described above in the discussion of gender role conditioning.

Historically, in every population we know about, roughly ten percent of the population is homosexual.

In classic Greek and Roman societies homosexuality was accepted and practiced as part of the normal life style.

Today the controversy over the cause of homosexuality rages on between natural, psychological and religious or uniformed theories.

The natural theory states that the cause is in someway genetic.

The psychological theory is that the cause lies in childhood conditioning, as in dysfunctional parental influence, and then early experience of warm nurturing and sexual activity by a same sex other.

The religious idea is that the behavior is sinful, and the uninformed idea is that people choose to be homosexual.

Generally, sexuality seriously kicks in around puberty when emotional need and self worth gets connected to sexuality (as described in the above gender role conditioning discussion). More often than not when a person finds someone sexually attractive this person will have elements in his’r being that reminds the first one of a parent or significant other. This identity (or “transference” as the psychology field terms it) is usually subconscious.

One’s object d’mour serves as a surrogate for the parent figure. Typically in couples we see the struggle to get one’s needs met operating enormously and unconsciously in each of the couple (generally, needs that were not sufficiently met during childhood). Much of relationship conflict and distress derives from this. Typically the behavior is unconsciously acted out, one cannot explain it well and the other cannot listen well, the couple cannot understand one another well. If they are smart and courageous they seek out counseling and/or employ some strategy for communication such as offered in this ‘Life, Love, Health and Happiness’ document.

Liberation from Sexual and Gender role Conditioning

In no way is it suggested here, or judgment made here, as to what, in our sexual behaviors, is right or wrong, what is normal or abnormal. The purpose of these articles is to assist readers to think about their lives and the conditions that induce distress and unhappiness in our human lives.

This purpose includes reducing the painful effects of those conditions as well as to hold a mirror up to that which makes each one of us a precious and important member of our specie; a potentially valuable agent in the struggle to uplift humanity out of the swamp of irrational conflict and oppression.

In the preceding chapters of this document the reader can fully explore the healing aspects and strategies of self empowerment, emotional healing and mutual listening, the “Listening Partnership.”

We can reduce, even heal, the tensions produced by the gender and role conditioning we are typically subjected to in the oppressive society.

By such healing we actually heighten the experience of intimacy, and enrich our bonding with one another, while reducing the compulsive behaviors and conflicts related to sex that are so troubling and distressful.

Some suggestions to make our sexual lives happier and more fulfilling:

Read these chapters. Read them often until understanding takes hold.

Contact me through our board or via email for questions and guidance.

Set up a Listening Partnership with a willing other, and both make a commitment to confidentiality and to the process.

Take turns (chunks of time) to listen to one another. Talk about :

Everything you witnessed, heard about, seen, experienced with regard sex, sexuality or things that made you feel “funny” from your earliest memories to the present.

Talk about your fantasies as well as actual events.

Talk about the ideas and taboos relating to sex.

Talk about the distress. embarrassment and guilt you may have about the subject.

Talk about your relationships with your early family members and other significant persons; what they said, what they did, how they acted, how they may have confused you or hurt you.

Talk about the sweet and happy memories as well.

Talk about your earliest (to present) sexual encounters and experiences.

Express every new thought that comes up.

Let out all the feelings that come up as you process – the laughter, anger, fear, sadness, frustration, humiliation, thoughts as fully as you can.

Claim your inherent goodness, beauty and worth (despite all feelings to the contrary; these hurtful ideas were taught to you through how you treated and judged as you were growing up – that’s the personal oppression).

Develop a powerful direction (mantra) that contradicts the bad or unwanted beliefs, e.g. “How dare you treat me that way, and make me feel less. I am a good, beautiful valuable human being. I promise to think, say and hold this direction all the time.”

If you can’t find a listening partner, use a recorder or journal the material. Maybe someone on the board would be willing to trade messages with you in these regards (you can use the private message route). Contact me. I can’t promise to anyone a lot of time since I’m assisting many others, but I can sure support you and provide a boost.

I wish you love and the fulfillment of your uniqueness and dreams.